A victory of sorts
A victory of sorts
In August last year, the British government finally conceded, after years of denial and resistance, that servicemen had indeed been exposed to dangerous radiation levels during nuclear tests in Australia and the South Pacific in the 1950s, in which New Zealand sailors also participated or witnessed.
The admission came only after some 800 former servicemen from Britain, New Zealand and Fiji began a multimillion-dollar suit against the Ministry of Defence seeking compensation for being exposed to dangerous levels of radiation during tests at sites including Maralinga, in South Australia and at Christmas Island.
The admission was, however, a narrow one: the ministry agreed that the tests were responsible for the deaths of some British servicemen, but said only 159 were affected out of the 20,000 who were present………………. Just last week, after decades of refusal, France announced that it will compensate victims of past nuclear tests in the Pacific and the Sahara, and for the first time has formally recognised a link between the explosions and illnesses suffered by soldiers and civilians…………………………….
Quite properly, the French Government has decided the burden of proof should be reversed: victims will no longer have to prove that their illness was due to the nuclear tests; it will be up the state to prove otherwise.
Furthermore, compensation will apply to any nationality.
Given past attitudes, however, we may expect that getting it will prove to be extremely difficult.
Fallout of Serbia Bombing ‘Continues to Kill’
Fallout of Serbia Bombing ‘Continues to Kill’by Vesna Peric ZimonjicGlobal Research, March 27, 2009
Ten years after the NATO bombing of Serbia, concern is rising over a rise in the number of reported cases of cancer.
Some 15 tons of ammunition fortified with depleted uranium was dropped by way of more than 50,000 bombs and missiles in the 11 weeks of bombing of Serbia in 1999. The targets of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) bombing were 116 locations, mostly in southern part of Serbia and the Kosovo region.
Depleted uranium (DU) is placed at the tip of bombs for piercing the armor of tanks and heavy military vehicles. Although weakened in the production process, the uranium remains highly toxic…………………………..
Nebojsa Srbljak, a physician from the Kosovan town Mitrovica, which still has a large Serb population, has spoken of a tenfold rise in leukemia cases. “Leukemia among children in Kosovo was at the rate of one per thousand before 1999,” he told media representatives. “Since 1999, it rose to 1 percent.”
Dr. Srbljak who is cooperating with an oncology clinic in the Kosovan capital Pristina, said that Albanian doctors too had told him there was “a significant rise” in the number of cancer patients since 1999. In the whole of Kosovo the cancer rate before 1999 was 10 among 300,000 people, and “today it stands at 20 among 60,000,” he said.
“It’s one tumor each day we’re discovering now,” radiologist Vlastimir Cvetkovic told IPS. “Prior to 1999 it was one in three months. And this is not just due to better diagnostics, as our working conditions were and remain modest. Besides, it’s now younger and younger people, and children we’re having as patients.”
An alarming rise in cancer cases has been recorded also in neighboring Bosnia-Herzegovina, where DU was used by NATO against Bosnian Serb forces earlier in 1995. According to official figures, more than 300 people from the Sarajevo neighborhoods Hadzici and Han Pijesak in eastern Bosnia died of cancer from 1996 until 2000. Hadzici was inhabited and held by Bosnian Serbs during the war. It later came under the jurisdiction of the central Muslim-Croat government in Sarajevo.
Khatami: Israeli nukes the problem
Khatami: Israeli nukes the problem
The Age Daniel Flitton * March 26, 2009IRAN’s former president, Mohammad Khatami, has rejected claims that the Islamic republic is secretly developing nuclear weapons.Speaking in Melbourne yesterday, Dr Khatami said neighbouring countries with atomic arsenal pose a far greater threat to Middle East stability.”If there is a real concern about proliferation, we have to tackle the problem of these countries right now having nuclear arms in the region, not putting pressure on a country that doesn’t have such intention and there is no strategy of having nuclear weapons,” he said.Dr Khatami did not name countries, however Israel is the only Middle Eastern country said to posses nuclear weapons — a program Tel Aviv has never officially acknowledged.
A Nuclear Pandora’s Box
A Nuclear Pandora’s Box Khaleej Times Claude Salhani13 March 2009 – “,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Until now Israel was the only country in the region armed with nuclear weapons and the capacity to deliver them. Now with Iran entering into the Middle East political arena, and given its ambitions to obtain nuclear capabilities, it opens up a whole new Pandora’s box.
A nuclear-powered Pandora’s box in the possession of the Islamic republic, and depending on which experts one listens to, the contents of which could become operational as early as 2010 or 2011. The danger, besides the obvious, is that of nuclear proliferation in the region. What will the reaction from other Arab countries likely be? Will Saudi Arabia and Egypt not want to follow suit?
Does adding nuclear weapons not just further complicate the peace process, if there is even such a thing left? Indeed, is the Arab-Israeli peace process, or what’s left of it, still salvageable? That question was raised this week by Aaron David Miller, a former Arab-Israeli peace negotiator and a former adviser to six US secretaries of State at a discussion held at the Nixon Center in Washington…………………………….
There are three avenues, none of which are likely to lead to a conclusive peace agreement in the Middle East. First is if Iran voluntarily reneges on its nuclear programme; chances of that happening are about as good as an ayatollah becoming pope.
Second is if Israel destroys some of Iran’s nuclear making capability, move that would only amplify the crisis and augment the level of animosity between Iran and Israel. And it would not stop Iran’s march towards nuclear armament. It would only accentuate it.
Third alternative: accept a nuclear powered Iran, a move that is very likely to kick off a nuclear proliferation race in the Middle East, as mentioned earlier.
Cricket massacre lays bare the flaws of a failing state
From The Sunday Times March 8, 2009 Cricket massacre lays bare the flaws of a failing stateThe Pakistan terrorist attack and its aftermath have underlined the violence and corruption at the heart of a nuclear nation “……………….
…………..Unlike Pakistan’s military rulers, Zardari has no sympathy for the militant groups, pointing out that he lost his own wife, Benazir Bhutto, to terrorism. But he heads a weak minority government in alliance with an Islamic party linked to some of them.While Pakistan remains a largely moderate country, support for militants has increased with public anger at US drone attacks in Pakistan’s tribal areas. These have killed senior Taliban or Al-Qaeda commanders but also many civilians. “Zardari may wish to be rid of the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, the LeT and other affiliated terrorist groups, but he cannot afford to be seen to cave in to western and Indian pressure”, said MJ Gohel, director of the Asia Pacific Foundation. “The terrorist infrastructure is being allowed to continue functioning with only cosmetic restrictions, whose main function is to impress the US. Yet until firm action is taken and training camps are closed down, the slow collapse of the Pakistani state will continue.”………………….
If nothing works, America could be confronted with the nightmare of a nuclear-armed and fragmented Pakistan in the hands of Islamic radicals.
For years the United States has been studying how to remove or disable Pakistan’s nuclear weapons in the event of an emergency, but it is highly delicate.
Cricket massacre lays bare the flaws of a failing state – Times Online
Israel mulling strike on Iran nuclear facilities
Israel mulling strike on Iran nuclear facilities – Washington, 5 March (IranVNC)—Israel is seriously considering taking unilateral military action to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, although the time frame for action is quickly fading, according to a report by top US political figures and experts released Wednesday.The nine-page report, entitled “Preventing a Cascade of Instability”, was put out by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.The bipartisan group, several of whose members met high-level Israeli officials to assess their perspective, said that Israeli leaders seem convinced that at least for now, they have a military option.
Evidence mounts of Syrian nuclear cover-up: U.S. | Reuters
Evidence mounts of Syrian nuclear cover-up: U.S.
By Mark Heinrich
VIENNA (Reuters) – The United States said on Wednesday that U.N. inspectors had found growing evidence of covert nuclear activity in Syria, and European allies said a lack of Syrian transparency demanded utmost scrutiny.
The U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, is looking into U.S. intelligence reports that Syria had almost built a North Korean-designed, nuclear reactor meant to yield bomb-grade plutonium before Israel bombed it in 2007.
Uranium
Book Reviews
Uranium
From atomic bombs to cellphones, a history of uranium’s rise.
THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR By Steve Weinberg | March 5, 2009 edition
“…………………………After Zoellner dispenses with World War II-related uranium lore, he covers the uranium saga from multiple angles. Some of the book’s latter half is organized geographically, as Zoellner demonstrates the moral and financial impacts of uranium fever in locales as diverse as Niger, Australia, and the state of Utah. Other portions of the book are organized by the product-yields of uranium – medical treatments, energy to power homes and businesses, and decorative uses (despite the danger.)
The perils are rarely far from the center of the discussion, even when everybody involved in a uranium enterprise is well intentioned.After all, Zoellner explains, uranium “cannot undergo fission in a reactor without producing a tiny residue of plutonium,” the form used in bombmaking. “A ‘peaceful’ nuclear reactor is no different in basic design from the complex at Hanford [Washington State] that manufactured the plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb.”Then, Zoellner comments sagely, “herein lies one of the damnable paradoxes of uranium: The apparatus that spins a turbine also happens to be a munitions plant. One is a coefficient of the other; the mineral cannot escape its own unstable essence.”…………………………
Iran Says Its Missiles Can Reach Israel Nuclear Installations
Iran Says Its Missiles Can Reach Israel Nuclear Installations
By Ladane Nasseri
March 4 (Bloomberg) — Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps said Israeli nuclear sites are within the range of its missiles and warned that the Persian Gulf country will defend itself in the eventuality of military strikes.
“All of the facilities in different areas of the land occupied by the Zionist regimes are within reach of Iran’s missile defenses,” the Corps’ head, Mohammad Ali Jafari, was quoted as saying by the state-run Iranian Students News Agency………………….
Israel has indicated that it may hit Iran’s nuclear sites to cut short Iran’s progress in the nuclear field. The U.S. and Israel claim that Iran’s atomic program is aimed at developing weapons while the Middle-Eastern country says it only seeks to produce electricity.
Iran has missiles with a range of more than 2,000 kilometers (1,240 miles) putting all of Israel’s land including its nuclear sites within reach, Jafari said. Iran doesn’t recognize the legitimacy of the Jewish state.
Nuclear weapons no longer serve a military purpose
The Irish Times TONY KINSELLA 2 March 09
Two modern dinosaurs flirted with catastrophe last month – nuclear submarines each armed with 16 ballistic missiles
THE child in Hans Christian Andersen’s The Emperor’s New Clothes told it like he saw it, leaving the surrounding adults to address the consequences……………….
France and the UK each possess four of these ballistic missile-launching submarines, one of which is always on patrol. They are “Doomsday” weapons, designed to slip undetectably through the oceans. According to the Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) logic of nuclear warfare, they would fire their missiles long after Paris and London had been reduced to rubble. Being “undetectable”, they cannot be eliminated and thus act as a deterrent to potential assailants.
They cost around €2 billion each to build and equip, and millions more each year to operate. Silence is their primary defence and billions have been spent coating their hulls with anechoic materials, and making their reactors, turbines and pumps as noiseless as possible.
Missile submarines rarely use active sonar as it is relatively easy to locate the origin of its sound pulses. They rely on passive sonar, or inordinately expensive underwater microphones, to listen out for others’ sounds.
HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant are, dinosaur-like, so successfully over-specialised in silent slinking that neither heard the other – until they collided in the Bay of Biscay. Damaged, they both limped home to their respective bases for expensive repairs.
The incident would almost be funny, in a Martin McDonagh form of black humour, were the potential consequences not so lethal. ……………There are still over 20,000 useless, dangerous and arguably immoral nuclear warheads on our planet. They leave us, in the words of Sinéad O’Connor, “exposed, with a severe case of the emperor’s new clothes”.
It’s time to get rid of them before they get rid of us. http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/0302/1224242083298.html
Iran must end ‘nuclear standoff’
Iran must end ‘nuclear standoff’ Aljazeera.net NEWS EUROPE March 02, 2009 Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the UN atomic watchdog, has urged Iran to co-operate with the international community and be transparent over its nuclear programme.
He said: “I again urge Iran to implement all measures required to build confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of its nuclear programme at the earliest possible date and to unblock this stalemated situation.”
Speaking at the beginning of a week-long meeting of the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, he also appeared to express hope that the United States’ apparent change in policy towards Iran would help resolve the problem.
“I am hopeful that the apparent fresh approach by the international community to dialogue with Iran will give new impetus to the efforts to resolve this long-standing issue,” he said.
Barack Obama, the new US president, has signalled that Washington may be willing to talk to Tehran over the two countries’ relations.
The United Nations has demanded Iran suspend its enrichment programme over fears it could be used to produce nuclear weapons.
Iran denies the charge, saying its programme is only for generating electricity.
Despite a six-year investigation, the IAEA has been unable to determine whether or not Iran’s uranium enrichment programme is intended for peaceful purposes.
Mongolia to host meeting for nuclear weapons free zone
Mongolia Web 2 March 09 Mongolia will hold a regional meeting of nations to discuss issues related to maintaining the area as a nuclear weapons free zone. Announced by the Ministry of External Relations, the meeting will be held in Ulaanbaatar on April 27 and 28. Specifically, attendees will discuss preparations for the third preparatory committee for the 2010 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) review conference as well as for the second Conference of the States parties and signatories to the nuclear weapons free zone treaties, which is scheduled in 2010. Nearly 120 nations have declared themselves members of the nuclear weapons free zone. The creation of such zones are considered important regional measures of strengthening international peace and security, reinforcing the nuclear non-proliferation regime and effective means for achieving nuclear disarmament.
What Would Happen to Your City If It Got Nuked?
What would happen to your city if it got nuked? 109.com 26 Feb 09 A new Google mashup reveals what kind of damage you could expect after a nuclear attack on your city, and highlights the effects of radiation spreading outward from the blast. At BLDG BLOG, Geoff Manaugh talks about the history of “nuclear urbanism,” calling this map mashup by CarlosLabs in Australia as its latest example. The mashup, called Ground Zero, is disturbingly simple: You can pick your city, then pick your weapon (anything from 1950s “Fat Man” to an asteroid collision), then hit the button that says “Nuke it!”. Then the map blooms with flame and destruction.
Dystopia Can Be Fun: What Would Happen to Your City If It Got Nuked?
Defence in the realm of fear
Defence in the realm of fear The Canberra Times 26 Feb 09 Although it is only early days for the Obama Administration, the President and his team have been conspicuously silent about whether they will persist with the Bush administration’s controversial doctrine of pre-emptive self-defence. Developed in response to the September 11 attacks, the Bush Doctrine, as it is known, asserts a right to use military force against perceived terrorist threats before those threats can materialise into actual armed attacks.Asked recently about the future of the doctrine, President-elect Barack Obama, as he was then, responded, ”We have to view our security in terms of a common security and a common prosperity with other peoples and other countries.” While this is by no means a repudiation of the doctrine, we can be hopeful that President Obama’s broader foreign policy objectives, which emphasise engagement and multilateralism, may signal a shift back to a pre-Bush position of adherence to the international rule of law.
The Bush Doctrine is a significant departure from accepted norms of international law. After World War II, the international community vowed to end the scourge of war and promote international peace and security through proper adherence to principles of justice and international law.
The UN Charter embodies that commitment. Article 2 (4) of the charter prohibits the use of force by one state against others and is considered such a fundamental principle of law that no nation has the right to depart from it.
Military force is allowed only if the Security Council authorises its use or a country acts in self-defence under Article 51 of the UN Charter…….
Launching pre-emptive strikes against Iran would also reinforce a dangerous precedent, established by the invasion of Iraq, that would enable other countries to act in the same way.
Countries such as Pakistan, India, China, North Korea and indeed Iran would be given the green light to advance similar claims and act pre-emptively if they believed they were threatened by another country.
……….The potential to misuse the doctrine of pre-emption is too great to make it an acceptable approach to maintaining global and regional security.
Australia has also given equivocal support for the doctrine of pre-emption. Although it has never been a stated policy objective, in an interview in 2004 John Howard insisted it was open to Australia to take pre-emptive action against terrorists, particularly in South-East Asia. This generated deep suspicion among our neighbours.
The Howard government also supported the invasion of Iraq, thereby endorsing the doctrine used by the US to justify the allied intervention.
The Rudd Government has always been critical of the Bush Doctrine but has not unequivocally disavowed it.
As one of its election commitments, the Government is commissioning a Defence white paper which, among other things, will set out Australia’s strategic defence and national security objectives. The Government should make clear in the white paper that the doctrine of pre-emption forms no part of Australia’s defence or foreign policy options.
This would not only honour Australia’s commitment to promoting the international rule of law but demonstrate the kind of global leadership that would be required of Australia if it is to gain a seat on the UN Security Council in 2013.
Defence in the realm of fear – Opinion – Editorial – General – The Canberra Times
We Owe It To Ourselves To Abandon Nuclear Energy
We owe it to ourselves to abandon nuclear energy
The Herald Peter Curran 23 Feb 09 “……………Every advocate of civil nuclear power generation I have read, heard or met personally is either an advocate of nuclear weapons, nuclear defence policies and the so-called “nuclear deterrent”, or, frankly, must be naive, and unaware or badly informed about this insidious linking of the civil and military aspects.
Any country that has nuclear power has the undeniable potential to make nuclear weapons. This is why the west is making such a fuss over Iran’s nuclear programme. It was also the ostensible reason for invading Iraq. The UK is a massive exporter of nuclear technology and uranium enrichment processes, and this is at the core of nuclear weapons production. If the UK abandoned this deadly trade and never built another nuclear power station, it would be taking a major step towards reducing international tension, nuclear proliferation and creating a safer planet.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is charged with investigating the regular, and sinister, transfer of nuclear material between civil and military stockpiles, but its powers are limited, and, by the UK government’s own admission, its acceptance of inspection was not intended to provide an assurance that such material would not be used for defence purposes……………………..The nuclear power industry and the nuclear arms industry are conjoined twins, locked forever in a deadly embrace, and cannot be separated. You can’t have one without the other. Until homo sapiens evolves into a greater maturity, the world can afford neither nuclear power generation nor nuclear arms. We owe it to ourselves, our children and our grandchildren to reject these deadly twins.
We Owe It To Ourselves To Abandon Nuclear Energy (from The Herald )
1 This Month
23-25 October – on Zoom – World BEYOND War’s annual global conferenc
Shut down the radiation-damaged Heysham nuclear reactors now
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
-
Archives
- October 2026 (231)
- September 2026 (339)
- August 2026 (330)
- July 2026 (355)
- June 2026 (287)
- May 2026 (306)
- April 2026 (356)
- March 2026 (251)
- February 2026 (267)
- January 2026 (308)
- December 2025 (358)
- November 2025 (359)
-
Categories
- 1
- 1 NUCLEAR ISSUES
- business and costs
- climate change
- culture and arts
- ENERGY
- environment
- health
- history
- indigenous issues
- Legal
- marketing of nuclear
- media
- opposition to nuclear
- PERSONAL STORIES
- politics
- politics international
- Religion and ethics
- safety
- secrets,lies and civil liberties
- spinbuster
- technology
- Uranium
- wastes
- weapons and war
- Women
- 2 WORLD
- ACTION
- AFRICA
- Atrocities
- AUSTRALIA
- Christina's notes
- Christina's themes
- culture and arts
- Events
- Fuk 2022
- Fuk 2023
- Fukushima 2017
- Fukushima 2018
- fukushima 2019
- Fukushima 2020
- Fukushima 2021
- general
- global warming
- Humour (God we need it)
- Nuclear
- RARE EARTHS
- Reference
- resources – print
- Resources -audiovicual
- Weekly Newsletter
- World
- World Nuclear
- YouTube
-
RSS
Entries RSS
Comments RSS
