Pakistan test-fires nuclear-capable surface-to-surface ballistic missile
The missile is capable of carrying nuclear and conventional warheads to a range of 2,750 kms, the statement said.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan said on Wednesday that it successfully test-fired a nuclear-capable surface-to-surface ballistic missile which can strike targets up to 2,750 kilometres. …… https://www.newindianexpress.com/world/2021/jan/20/pakistan-test-fires-nuclear-capable-surface-to-surface-ballistic-missile-2252773.html
Hiroshima ‘peace clock’ reset to 49 days following US nuclear test
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Hiroshima ‘peace clock’ reset to 49 days following US nuclear test https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20210119/p2a/00m/0na/004000c January 19, 2021 (Mainichi Japan) HIROSHIMA –– A clock located in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in this western Japan city was reset from 705 to 49, indicating the number of days that have passed since the latest nuclear test took place — a subcritical one carried out by the United States in November 2020. The adjustment was made on Jan. 18, after it was revealed in a U.S. national laboratory document that a subcritical nuclear experiment was held in November under the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. The “Chikyu Heiwa Kanshi Dokei (Peace Watch Tower)” had previously displayed the number “705” to mark the number of days that had passed since the subcritical nuclear experiment conducted by the U.S. in February 2019. As the exact date of the latest test in November is unknown, the clock is currently set at “49 days,” under the assumption that the nuclear test was held on the last day of the month. On Jan. 17, the Hiroshima Municipal Government sent a letter of protest addressed to President Trump to the U.S. Embassy in Japan. On the following day, some 35 people, including hibakusha, or A-bomb survivors, gathered at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in the city’s Naka Ward, which includes the peace memorial museum, and staged a sit-in protest. President-elect Joe Biden, who will be inaugurated on Jan. 20, issued a statement vowing to “work to bring us closer to a world without nuclear weapons,” on Aug. 6, 2020, which marked the 75th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima. (Japanese original by Isamu Gari, Hiroshima Bureau) |
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Local governments in Japan growing more reliant on nuclear taxes
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Local governments growing more reliant on nuclear taxes, THE ASAHI SHIMBUN, by Hideki Muroya and Takuho Shiraki.January 20, 2021 Local governments are increasingly depending on tax revenues from the nuclear plants they host, a relationship that has deepened over the 10 years since the Fukushima nuclear disaster, an analysis by The Asahi Shimbun shows.That follows the introduction of new tax regimes that ensure a steady flow of nuclear-related tax yields–even when reactors are idle or in the process of being decommissioned. They were brought about largely through increasing existing taxes on nuclear fuels and levying new taxes on spent nuclear fuels kept at the plants.
In fiscal 2011, right after the triple meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, jurisdictions home to nuclear plants and related facilities yielded some 20.1 billion yen ($193.7 million) in taxes. The bulk of that came from taxes on nuclear fuel; many local governments only began collecting spent fuel taxes years after the accident. But then the figure more than doubled to an estimated 46.7 billion yen in fiscal 2020, ending in March, despite the nuclear plants being offline. The Asahi Shimbun studied nuclear-related tax revenues received by host municipalities and the 13 prefectures where those municipalities are located. Local governments can impose taxes on nuclear fuel and spent nuclear fuel at plants and related facilities through approving ordinances to do so. Of all the jurisdictions examined, Aomori Prefecture, where nuclear fuel cycle facilities are concentrated, and Fukui Prefecture, which hosts 15 reactors, the most in Japan, account for more than 60 percent earned through those taxes. The amount for fiscal 2020 is larger than the 40.3 billion yen brought in during fiscal 2010, when the plants were operating. Nuclear fuel taxes were originally based on the value of reactor fuel. As a result, six prefectures housing nuclear plants reported no tax revenues from nuclear fuel taxes in fiscal 2011. Desperate to secure income sources even during plant closures, Fukui Prefecture introduced in autumn 2011 a new fuel-tax system based on reactor output capacity–meaning the reactors can be taxed even when shut down. Other jurisdictions home to nuclear plants followed suit. ….. http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/14121969 |
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UK govt and Japan’s TEPCO to work together on robots to clean up Sellafield an Fukushima’s nuclear pollution
Professional Engineering, Dangerous radioactive material from Fukushima and Sellafield will be retrieved by robots thanks to a new collaboration between the UK and Japan.
The £12m LongOps project is also aimed at automating aspects of nuclear fusion energy production, alongside decommissioning goals.
The four-year research collaboration will use long-reach robotic arms to make decommissioning faster and safer at Tepco’s Fukushima Daiichi reactors in Japan and at Sellafield in the UK.
The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster saw a triple meltdown, three hydrogen explosions and the release of radioactive material after the loss of reactor core cooling following the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
The Sellafield site in Cumbria is used for nuclear fuel reprocessing and storage, as well as ongoing decommissioning of previous reactors and facilities. There were 21 serious incidents of off-site radiological releases at Sellafield between 1950 and 2000, according to a paper in the Journal of Radiological Protection.
The new project will be led by the UK Atomic Energy Authority’s Remote Applications in Challenging Environments (Race) facility. It will be funded equally by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), the UK Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) and Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco). ….
The decommissioning of legacy nuclear facilities and fusion facilities are complex large-scale projects that are time-intensive to accomplish safely. Using robotics allows teams to keep human workers out of danger. …… https://www.imeche.org/news/news-article/uk-and-japan-tackle-legacy-of-fukushima-and-sellafield-with-robotic-collaboration
India must oppose dumping of radioactive waste into the Pacific, but IAEA and Indian govt downplay the dangers
Silence on Fukushima Disaster Exposes our Approach to Nuclear Safety and Why India must Oppose Dumping of Radioactive Water Into the Pacific, BYSONALI HURIA, JANUARY 17, 2021 Next year, the operator of the tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant would start releasing radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean. A number of nations are up in arms against it, but Indian authorities are not rising to the occasion to protect its most vulnerable against the impending disaster.
SONALI HURIA explains what is at stake for people and the environment.
THE new year has begun on a grim note with a toxic gas leak at the Rourkela Steel Plant in Odisha on 6 January, which claimed the lives of four contractual workers. This is the latest in a disconcerting string of industrial accidents in India over the last few years, which have remained peripheral to the mainstream media narrative.
It appears that India has learned precious little from the Bhopal gas disaster, which has ebbed from public memory even as the accident site remains contaminated and survivors continue to await an elusive justice.
Against this backdrop, as we approach the tenth anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, it may be pertinent to think of what a nuclear accident might mean for the country’s already shoddy industrial safety record and systemic inadequacies, especially as the Fukushima disaster now poses a formidable new challenge to which India’s response, so far, has been active denial and muted silence.
“Fukushima” has become synonymous with the devastating and ongoing nuclear accident that occurred off the eastern Pacific coast of Japan in 2011.
Japan’s nuclear regulator, the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) reportedly stated as recently as in December 2020 that the reactor buildings of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant continue to record “lethal” levels of radiation, thus posing a “serious challenge” to decommissioning efforts.
DISPOSING CONTAMINATED WATER
Among the many vexing problems precipitated by the accident is the disposal of the contaminated water from the beleaguered nuclear plant.
The acerbic debate within Japan on the disposal of this radioactive water came to a head recently when the Japanese government made it clear that beginning 2022, the operator of the Fukushima plant, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), would start releasing radioactive water from the wrecked plant into the Pacific Ocean—a task envisaged to be accomplished over the next several years as part of larger decommissioning efforts.
Since the devastating earthquake and tsunami off the Pacific coast of Tōhoku triggered a meltdown at the three units of the nuclear plant in March 2011, cleanup efforts have required, among other things, the pumping of tens of thousands of tons of water to cool the smouldering reactor fuel cores.
However, this has led to a steady on-site accumulation of heavily contaminated water—as of 2020, TEPCO has nearly 1.23 million metric tons (and counting) of highly radioactive wastewater on its hands that has been stored in nearly 1,044 tanks…………
LOOMING DANGERS
Greenpeace International has warned that carbon-14, which TEPCO affirmed is present in the contaminated tank-water for the first time in August 2020, has the “potential to damage human DNA”.
Tokyo’s decision has understandably ruffled feathers globally.
The Republic of Korea, China, and Chile, state parties to the London Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and Other Matter, have repeatedly called for international deliberation and resolution of the problem, even as South Korea, which has banned all seafood imports from the region since the accident, has formally called upon the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to dissuade Japan. While the North Korean state media described the proposed discharge as a “criminal act”, a coalition of environmental and citizens’ groups from Taiwan petitioned the Japanese government in November 2020, expressing their objections.
The IAEA has confined itself to assisting the Japanese government rather than question or evaluates the proposed water disposal plan. It has demonstrated yet again that it is not the international nuclear watchdog many believe it to be.
UN Special Rapporteurs on hazardous wastes, right to food, rights to assembly and association, and the rights of indigenous people have also urged Japan not to use the present pandemic as a “sleight of hand” to release the radioactive water without any credible consultation within and outside Japan regarding a decision that will have a long-lasting impact on the environment and human health.
DANGERS FOR INDIA
The stakes for India cannot be overstated either.
In an unanticipated moment of candidness, nuclear health scientists from within the Indian establishment—the Defence Research Development Organisation (DRDO) and the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS)—have warned that the release of the Fukushima wastewater containing “radioactive isotopes such as cesium, tritium, cobalt and carbon-12” will prove disastrous for human and aquatic health across the world’s coastal belts by crippling fishing economies and causing a “spectrum of diseases, including cancer”……..
the Indian government, in particular, its nuclear establishment, has consistently downplayed the risks associated with nuclear energy to public and environmental health, even labelling public concerns surrounding radiation “myths”, and whose first reactions to the Fukushima nuclear accident were of impudent denial.
… EAS Sarma, former Union Power Secretary to the Government of India, has exhorted the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) to apprise the Prime Minister’s Office of the “far-reaching implications” of the proposed release of the radioactive Fukushima water, and for India to take a firm stand at the IAEA against this unilateral decision of the Japanese government.
TEPCO has reportedly already been draining hundreds of tonnes of contaminated water into the Pacific Ocean. Noting with dismay the abject silence of the DAE and India’s Environment Ministry in this regard, Sarma identifies the lack of a robust nuclear regulatory body or mechanism in India as responsible for this lack lustre approach to an issue of great import for the health of the people of the country and the larger marine ecology of the region.
Domestically, it is time to pause and think whether India is equipped to handle an accident of the scale of Fukushima—a nuclear Bhopal?
Sarma’s letter to the Cabinet Secretary also underscores the need for the government to recognise the magnitude of the devastation wrought by nuclear accidents, the inability of TEPCO to handle the disaster even a decade since its occurrence, and thus to pause its own plans “to import reactors on a large scale and enlarge nuclear power generation capacity”.
…..…DOWNPLAYING THE DANGERS
In effect, therefore, the IAEA has demonstrated yet again that it is not the international nuclear watchdog many believe it to be. In her fascinating new account of the Chernobyl nuclear accident, Manual for Survival, the environmental historian, Kate Brown, explores the IAEA’s complicity in downplaying the accident and denying radiation impacts in exposed Chernobyl children and even asserting that “radiation anxiety” stems from “irrational fears”, as nuclear technocrats across the globe are prone to doing.
In the tenth year of the ongoing Fukushima accident, therefore, it is imperative that a dialogue be initiated on the need for an effective international nuclear monitoring regime that isn’t also tasked with the responsibility of promoting nuclear energy.
Domestically, it is time to pause and think whether India is equipped to handle an accident of the scale of Fukushima—a nuclear Bhopal?
At the very least, it is time India’s government demonstrates that it is willing and able to deploy its purportedly surging international stature and influence under Prime Minister Narendra Modi to protect the country’s environment and the health of its vulnerable communities against the Fukushima water release, which appears a near certainty now. https://www.theleaflet.in/silence-on-fukushima-disaster-exposes-our-approach-to-nuclear-safety-and-why-india-must-oppose-dumping-of-radioactive-water-into-the-pacific/#
Thyroid cancer at ages 0 and 2 at the time of the nuclear accident-Health survey in Fukushima Prefecture January 2021
Thyroid cancer at ages 0 and 2 at the time of the nuclear accident-Health survey in Fukushima 
Prefecture Posted by: ourplanet Posted on: Thu, 01/14/2021 –00:46 http://ourplanet-tv.org/?q=node/2537 (Japanese only)
(Translated from Google) The “Prefectural Health Survey” Review Committee was held in Fukushima City on the 15th to discuss the health survey of Fukushima citizens following the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. For the first time, it was discovered that two infants, a 0-year-old girl and a 2-year-old girl at the time of the accident, were diagnosed with thyroid cancer.
Material https://www.pref.fukushima.lg.jp/site/portal/kenkocyosa-kentoiinkai-40.html
This time, the result of the fourth round of thyroid examination until June last year was newly announced. The number of children diagnosed with suspected thyroid cancer by fine needle cytology increased by 6 from the previous time to 27, and the number of children who underwent thyroidectomy increased by 3 from the previous time to 16 children. Up to now, 252 patients have been diagnosed with thyroid cancer or suspected thyroid cancer from prior examination, of which 203 have undergone thyroid surgery. 202 people, excluding one, were confirmed to have thyroid cancer.
In the fourth round of examination, it was found for the first time that a girl who was 0 years old and a girl who was 2 years old at the time of the accident were diagnosed with thyroid cancer. Since the age of the examination is not the actual age but the grade, the ages at the time of the examination are 9 years old (3rd grade of elementary school) and 11 years old (5th grade of elementary school), respectively. According to the previous test results of 27 patients, 5 patients had “A1 judgement” without nodules or tumors, and 16 people had “A2 judgement” with nodules of 5 mm or less or cysts of 2 cm or less, 5 mm or more. 5 people had a “B-judgement” with nodules or cysts of 2 cm or more, and 1 had not been examined. He had the smallest tumor size of 6.1 mm and the largest tumor was 29.4 mm.
What stands out in the results of the fourth round of examination is the high dose of radiation for people diagnosed with thyroid cancer. Of the 27 patients diagnosed as suspected of being malignant by fine needle cytology, 11 patients (40.7%) who submitted the basic survey questionnaire had an exposure dose of less than 1 mSv in 2 patients (18.1%) 4 months after the accident. The number of children exposed to 2mSv or more was the highest, with 4 (36.3%) from 1mSv to 2mSv and 5 (45.5%) from 2mSv to 5mSv. In particular, the two boys who were five years old at the time of the accident were both over 2mSv.
According to the results of the basic survey of all Fukushima residents, 62.2% are less than 1mSv, 31.6% are from 1mSv to 2mSv, and 5.5% are from 2mSv to 3mSv. Very different.
To review the mass examination at school At this review committee, a major shift was made to reviewing simultaneous examinations at schools. The test, which has found more than 200 people with thyroid cancer, raises the theory of “overdiagnosis” among experts who deny the effects of radiation exposure, saying that they are finding thyroid cancer that they do not have to find. There is a growing opinion that the mass examination at school should be reviewed.
Based on these opinions, the review committee decided to conduct an interview survey at schools in the prefecture on August 31st last time. This time, there was a report on the results of a survey conducted by the prefecture at 26 elementary and junior high schools and high schools in the prefecture.
At many schools, thyroid examinations were performed during class hours, criticized by Shoichiro Tsugane, a member of the National Cancer Center, saying, “You can’t take this without a strong will.” “The benefits of the test are not except that you can be reassured when you get negative. The discovery of thyroid cancer has little benefit in avoiding death or poor quality of life, especially when you are diagnosed with thyroid cancer. “I think it will be a huge disadvantage for those who do,” he said. “Thyroid examination in a group of asymptomatic healthy people is not desirable. I asked him to stop the mass examination at school. ..
In addition, Professor Toshiya Inaba of Hiroshima University also cut out at the school examination that “they are left behind” and said, “Parents are not worried. The school rents the venue. The prefectural medical college has an inspection. I understand each position well, but in the end, it is the people who are left unattended. ” He emphasized that the prefectures and medical colleges that are the subjects of the survey should explain more to children and students the significance of the test and the fact that it can be rejected.
In response, Professor Satoshi Tomita of Fukushima University argued head-on. He criticized that “many Fukushima residents have anxiety about their health” and that members of the Prefectural Health Investigation Committee, especially members outside Fukushima Prefecture, are calling for the cancellation or reduction of examinations. He said that thyroid examination is a way to relieve the anxiety of Fukushima residents, “the anxiety of Fukushima residents, especially those with children, is left behind.” “It is dangerous to go in the direction of reduction easily.” “Thinking” was pointed out.
Ikuko Abe, chairman of the Fukushima Clinical Psychologists Association, who also lives in Fukushima Prefecture and has a close relationship with schools, agrees with this, saying, “I agree with Professor Tomita’s opinion.” “Given the anxiety about radiation that Fukushima residents have, thyroid examinations are very reassuring,” she said. “Reducing or eliminating the examinations still takes the opposite position. I want you to do it. “
What caught my eye in the discussion was the presence of Katsushi Tahara, director of the Ministry of the Environment’s Health and Welfare Department. The members of the review committee from the Ministry of the Environment have not said much, but have played a role in important aspects of policy change. This time too, Mr. Tahara considers the fact that the school is cooperating with the implementation of the examination, such as encouraging households whose delivery to Fukushima Medical University is delayed to submit again when the deadline has passed. About 30% of the children undergoing medical examinations at school were asked intensively about this point, such as confirming that the school side took over the collection of consent forms.
To conduct hearings with the person to be inspected Following a survey of the school, the prefecture proposed to have a place to hear directly from the children and students who had been inspected. Questions were raised about the representativeness of the interviewees, and there was an opinion requesting a quantitative survey such as a questionnaire, but the prefecture’s proposal was approved because the survey took too long.
Regarding this “interview survey,” there was a harsh debate over the neutrality of the content, such as the opinion that a pilot study was unavoidable and that the voices of patients diagnosed with thyroid cancer should also be heard. With the strong push back of the constellation chairman, it was decided that the selection of the target audience and the holding method would be left to the chairperson and the prefecture. The results will be reported at the next meeting.
In response to the further shift to reviewing mass screening at school in this “interview,” Chiba parent and child of the “thyroid cancer support group Hydrangea Association” that supports families with thyroid cancer said, “Accident Among the 0-year-old and 2-year-old children at that time, a child with thyroid cancer appeared and my chest hurts. Thyroid cancer also has recurrence and metastasis, and early detection and early treatment are beneficial for the child. Given that the cancer was found in a school test, there can be no argument to eliminate the school test. ” The group has made offers to the prefecture three times in the past and opposes the reduction of inspections.
13.7 million sign petition urging all nations to ban nuclear weapons
13 million sign petition urging all nations to ban nuclear weapons, http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/14106594, By RYO SASAKI/ Staff Writer, January 14, 2021 A petition by an organization of survivors of the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki urging all nations to sign the U.N. treaty banning nuclear weapons has garnered a whopping 13.7 million signatures.The Appeal of the Hibakusha association made the announcement during an online news conference on Jan. 13 after submitting the petition to the United Nations on Jan. 8.
The treaty goes into effect on Jan. 22.
The association collected the signatures on the streets, internet and elsewhere before finishing the effort at the end of December.
A total of 1,497 incumbent and former prefectural governors and mayors in Japan added their names to the petition. The petition also drew support from numerous people in countries other than Japan.
The campaign association, comprised of members of Nihon Hidankyo (Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations) and other organizations, began their activities to achieve a nuclear-free world “while we still live” in April 2016.
The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons was adopted in July 2017. Since then, the campaign has been asking all nations to join the treaty and advocating for it to take effect as early as possible.
The campaign to collect signatures was initially to end by September 2020, but was extended after it appeared that the treaty was likely to go into effect in the near future.
The association collected more than 1 million signatures over the additional three months, mainly online.
Why Japanese people should say ‘Sayonara’ to nuclear energy- a nun’s voice for nuclear victims
Sister Reiley, who has served as a missioner in Japan since 1968, was referring to the accident at Fukushima-Daichi Nuclear plant, which occurred on March 11, 2011. The accident was triggered by a devastating tsunami that followed a powerful 9.0 earthquake that hit a large part of Japan’s northern coast.
The quake and tsunami left more than 18,000 people dead or missing and hundreds of thousands of houses and businesses destroyed, according to Japan’s National Police Agency. More than 160,000 people fled the region near the nuclear plant because of the meltdown and more than 40,000 are still unable to return home due to radiation contamination.
Last June, Sister Reiley took the 3.5-hour train ride from Tokyo, where she lives, to Fukushima to give this Maryknoll reporter a tour around Haramachi, a town near where the Fukushima-Daichi nuclear accident happened.
The area had the feeling of a sci-fi apocalyptic movie: A ghost town with abandoned farmlands that could not be used; streets blocked with fences and no-trespassing signs; decaying houses damaged by the earthquake that cannot be repaired because they are contaminated; Geiger counter boxes under the street signs to measure the level of radioactivity; thousands of huge black vinyl bags filled with radioactive dirt; security guards wearing masks and radioactive protective gear at checkpoints, only allowing entrance to radioactive waste cleaning crews—many of them immigrants who are temporarily hired to do a job that could harm their health. …….
Sister Reiley has striven to show God’s love for the people by speaking out against nuclear energy in a country whose 52 nuclear plants, she believes, pose an enormous threat to human life.
After the triple disaster in 2011, Sister Reiley responded to the Japanese Catholic Church’s call for volunteers. “Initially I went several times a year to several different Japan Caritas bases wherever the need was at the time,” says Sister Reiley. “But gradually towns far away from the reactor returned to normal, (except) Haramachi where the need is still great for the elderly, differently abled and those people in a low economic bracket. They don’t have the means to move away from the reactor area.”
…….. Her concern about nuclear energy began in 1979 in her native Schuylkill County, Pa. She was visiting home from her mission in Japan when there was a reactor meltdown at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in nearby Dauphin County. It is considered the most serious nuclear accident in U.S. history, according to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
“We’re poisoning our earth,” Sister Reiley remembers her father saying shortly after the nuclear accident.
“In 1999, there was a nuclear accident at the Tokaimura [nuclear facility] in Ibaraki Prefecture,” Sister Reiley says. “About two years after that accident happened, I asked the families [at the cancer hospital], ‘Where are you from?’ ‘Ibaraki.’ ‘Where are you from?’ ‘Ibaraki.’”
Out of the 24 beds for children with cancer at the hospital, at the time, seven children were from Ibaraki, explains the missioner. “But nobody can document that and say absolutely, ‘that’s why [the nuclear accident] they got cancer’.”
Still, the missioner works tirelessly to raise awareness about the dangers in nuclear energy Nearly 25 years after the 1986 nuclear accident in Chernobyl, in the former Soviet Union, Sister Reiley read an article, in a Japanese newspaper, about the high incidences of cancer linked to the nuclear accident. The report cited a study conducted by an international team of researchers led by the National Cancer Institute. That gave the Maryknoll sister an opportunity to question what happened at the nuclear facility in Japan. She visited the newspaper headquarters to speak to the editors.
“Won’t you please do some research about Tokaimura? About the accident that happened in Ibaraki?” she asked. The paper did not respond to her request. She was undaunted.
That sombre day in June in Haramachi, as we drove back to the train station, we saw a farm with cattle and stopped for a lesson from Sister Reiley. She explained that the government had asked the owner to kill the cattle. The cows’ milk could not be sold nor could the cows be slaughtered to sell their meat because they were contaminated. The cows, she continued, were innocent victims of problems caused by human beings.
“But this wonderful man asked the government to let the cows live a natural life and die a natural death,” says Sister Reiley.
Then she translated a sign at the cattle ranch. “We lived here with no fear of nuclear energy and now we realise that we lost something that can never be returned to us and we want people to understand that we have to say sayonara, goodbye, to nuclear energy.” https://catholicoutlook.org/jana-voice-for-nuclear-victims/
Military strategy relying on nuclear weapons – a dangerous myth
 The myth of nuclear power, Financial Express By: fe Features | January 10, 2021 A cogent analysis of why just mere possession of nuclear weapons does not guarantee victory; sound strategy does,…….. ” In National Security and Conventional Arms Race: Spectre of a Nuclear War, Asthana argues that there is no way the Indian military can guarantee a “solution of the Pakistan problem or the China problem” by inflicting a decisive defeat on the nuclear-armed adversaries, frenzied race to import conventional weapons notwithstanding.
Consider these lines in the opening chapter: “We might blunder into a war almost unknowingly because since the past few years, people have collectively started consuming the heady mix of a cleverly manufactured hyper-nationalism and xenophobia. This means that both the people and the rulers have been playing into the hands of populist sentiments and exploit them in turn for electoral benefits… In popular perception, shared by political as well as military leaders, no significance is attached to the fact that both Pakistan and China are nuclear powers. It demonizes them with all the attributes of an evil human being, who will not behave unless they are spanked… Under a delusion that we have somehow, magically become invincible, a large number of Indians seem to be itching for a war.”
Asthana cautions that our weapon acquisition notwithstanding, our invincibility in a nuclear neighbourhood may be a myth. He points out that nobody has so far invented a miraculous weapon anywhere in the world that could ensure a quick, decisive victory in a conventional or nuclear war. Cautioning against the growing trend of politicians exploiting enmity with Pakistan for electoral benefits, he says this has left India with a one-dimensional policy, one which is unrealistic in view of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.
India’s Achilles heel, he argues, is that there is no “national war-fighting strategy”………
“In any case, the moment Pakistan feels that it is going to lose a conventional war under the weight of a bigger Indian military, they will have to go nuclear immediately. This is not 1971 and a military defeat now will become an existential crisis for Pakistan as a nation, something they cannot afford at all. A decisive victory in a conventional war, short or long, in a nuclear overhang, is therefore a treacherous fallacy, spelling nothing but doom,” he says. To win any war, Indians, as a people, he asserts will have to be prepared for suffering the horrors and devastations of war. “Our strategic planning has not prepared the people for a nuclear war. Raw valour of troops is no substitute for sound strategy and the national will essential for sustaining great destruction,” he writes. ……..
Asthana concludes that Indian citizens and the political leadership must understand that accepting the nuclear reality is not synonymous with any sign of national impotence.
National Security and Conventional Arms Race: Spectre of a Nuclear War |
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Kim Jong Un signals plans to develop new nuclear weapons
Kim Jong Un signals plans to develop new nuclear weapons. North Korea raises tensions with incoming US administration of Joe Biden. Ft.com Edward White in Seoul JANUARY 9 2021 Kim Jong Un has signalled plans to develop new nuclear weapons and described the US as North Korea’s “biggest enemy”, moves that threaten to raise tensions with US president-elect Joe Biden. The North Korean leader’s comments, made at a rare gathering of top political officials in Pyongyang, marked the dictator’s strongest broadside against Washington since Mr Biden won the presidency in November’s election.
“Our external political activities going forward should be focused on suppressing and subduing the US, the basic obstacle, biggest enemy against our revolutionary development,” Mr Kim said, according to a translation by South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. ………. https://www.ft.com/content/b4971c6e-8b89-43b5-93d2-9098d5f229ef
Indonesia’s nuclear ambitions could prove disastrous for the Southeast Asian region
More dangerously, Indonesia’s nuclear stakeholders have traditionally run into trouble selling the idea of nuclear energy to their constituents given widespread fear over Indonesia being prone to earthquakes and volcanic activity given its unique position within the Pacific’s ‘Ring of Fire’.
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Will Indonesia become a nuclear power? https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/will-indonesia-become-a-nuclear-power-43025 6 Jan 21, In spite of its nuclear ambitions, Indonesia does not yet have the capacity to manage its nuclear waste disposal, which could prove disastrous for the Southeast Asian region.
Indonesia may be taking steps to revive its nuclear ambitions under President Joko Widodo’s government. In February 2020, Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Indonesian minister of maritime affairs and former chief of staff to Widodo, publicly proclaimed that powerful nations like the United States do not see Indonesia as a serious international player due to its lack of nuclear weapons. His statement quickly captured local news headlines. The retired four-star army general turned political heavyweight is a major proponent behind recent interest in acquiring nuclear reactor technology to capitalize on Indonesia’s wealth of mineral resources. If Indonesia takes the nuclear track, it would be a major departure from its traditional foreign policy footing. Historically, Indonesia organised the Bandung Conference in 1955 which gave rise to a global Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) of African and Asian states who collectively opted out of aligning with either the United States or Russia during the dawn of the cold war. Nuclear pivot Continue reading |
High court drops TEPCO’s appeal against order for compensation to affected Fukushima worker
| High court drops TEPCO’s appeal against order for compensation to affected Fukushima worker |
http://www.japan-press.co.jp/modules/news/index.php?id=13357, December 17, 2020
In the court battle, the man, who worked for the TEPCO subsidiary Kandenko at the time of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, stated that he experienced anxiety over health problems due to radiation exposure during emergency work he was assigned to do at the crippled nuclear power plant. According to the worker, he was assigned to emergency work that included connecting cables to a power panel in the basement of the No. 3 reactor’s turbine building. He suffered external exposure to radiation of up to 10.81 mSv and internal exposure of 5.8 mSv. The worker demanded a total of 1.1 million yen in damage from his company and TEPCO on the grounds that they failed to fulfill their responsibility to ensure workers’ safety.
At the appeal hearing, TEPCO demanded that the district court decision be reviewed because the amount of radiation which the worker received was less than that needed to be compensated.
The high court ruling pointed out that it is generally accepted that exposure to some levels of radiation may increase the risk of health problems such as getting cancer. Stating that the plaintiff’s health anxiety is understandable, the court turned down the utility’s demand.
At a press conference after the ruling, lawyer Hirota Tsuguo on behalf of the plaintiff’s legal team said, “It is significant that the court ordered TEPCO, which has dominant power in the nuclear power-related industry, to compensate the worker. The company should abide by the court judgement.”
Past related article:
> Radiation-exposed worker sues TEPCO [May 8, 2014]
In March 2011 Japan’s government considered evacuating the then Emperor Akihito further away from Fukushima
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Emperor’s evacuation to Kyoto weighed after Fukushima nuclear disaster , Japan Times, 3 Jan 2021 The government led by the now-defunct Democratic Party of Japan unofficially proposed that then-Emperor Akihito evacuate to Kyoto or somewhere further west immediately after the eruption of the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis, a former administration official has said.However, the Imperial Household Agency flatly dismissed the idea, saying there was “no way” the emperor would do so at a time when people were not evacuating Tokyo, leading to the government of Prime Minister Naoto Kan to give up the proposal.
Several former senior officials at the Prime Minister’s Office separately said the administration at the time also briefly considered evacuating Prince Hisahito, the son of Crown Prince Akishino and Crown Princess Kiko, from Tokyo to Kyoto…….. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/01/02/national/emperor-fukushima-nuclear/ |
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Turkey’s aspirations to become a nuclear weapons power
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Will Turkey become a nuclear weapon power with Pak’s covert support? The Siasat Daily By IANS| 3rd January 2021 New Delhi: A rogue nexus involving Pakistan and Turkey, with China looking the other way, maybe taking root to fulfil Ankaras ambition to emerge as the worlds next nuclear weapon power.
Suspicions about Pakistan’s covert support for Turkish nukes has been aroused by a recent meeting of the Turkey-Pakistan High-Level Military Dialogue Group (HLMDG). The assemblage took place on December 22-23, 2020. Pakistan’s Defence Secretary Lt. Gen. (Retd.) Mian Muhammad Hilal Hussain led the delegation from Islamabad, while Deputy Chief of Turkish Army General Selcuk Bayraktaroglu headed the Turkish team, says an article published by the website zeenews.india.com.
There are other indications that collaboration on nuclear delivery systems was the hot topic discussed during the meeting. The visitors from Islamabad met top Turkish Army generals and bureaucrats dealing with missile production and aerial military hardware. The hosts included Professor Ismail Demir head of Presidency of Turkish Defence Industries and Temil Kotil, CEO of Turkish Aerospace Limited (TAI). The Pakistani defence delegation also visited top Turkish defence companies including Bakyar (UAV OEM), TAI, HAVELSAN and ASELSAN. Staunch strategic allies Analysts say that the insider meetings in Turkey took place within a rapidly evolving geopolitical context. Islamabad and Ankara have become staunch strategic allies, a partnership sealed by personal bonds between Turkey’s ambitious President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Pakistan’s military backed Prime Minister Imran Khan. It is no secret that Erdogan hopes to emerge as the pre-eminent Islamic leader, marginalising established heavyweights such as Mohamed bin Sultan, the Crown prince of Saudi Arabia………..
On his part, Erdogan has made no secret about his nuclear ambitions—a gateway for the fulfilment of his self-espoused dream of elevating Turkey’s status to the heights of the Ottoman empire.
In September 2019, he said: “Some countries have missiles with nuclear warheads, not one or two. I, however, am not supposed to have missiles with nuclear warheads. This, I cannot accept… And right next to us, there is Israel, right? With everything, it is frightening.”…….. https://www.siasat.com/will-turkey-become-a-nuclear-weapon-power-with-paks-covert-support-2059645/
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Fukushima nuclear clean-up hugely affected by discovery of lethal radiation levels
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Lethal Levels of Radiation Found in Damaged Fukushima Reactor Will Have ‘Huge Impact’ on Shutdown, Regulators Warn https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/12/30/lethal-levels-radiation-found-damaged-fukushima-reactor-will-have-huge-impact The radiation levels reported around shield plugs at two reactors are high enough to kill a worker exposed for even an hour. Brett Wilkins, staff writer
In what Japanese regulators on Wednesday called an “extremely serious” development, lethal levels of radiation have been recorded inside the damaged reactor building at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, threatening the shutdown and decommissioning of the site of the second-worst peacetime nuclear disaster in history.”This will have a huge impact on the whole process of decommissioning work.” —Toyoshi Fuketa, Nuclear Regulation Authority According to The Asahi Shimbun, Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) reported that massive amounts of radioactive materials have been found around shield plugs of the containment vessels in the No. 2 and No. 3 reactors. NRA officials estimated radiation levels at 10 sieverts per hour—enough to kill a worker who spends just one hour there. Decommission of the reactor requires workers to remove the shield plugs, which block radiation from the reactor core during normal plant operation. This discovery has forced officials to reconsider their shutdown plans. NRA chair Toyoshi Fuketa said that removing the highly irradiated shield plugs made safe retrieval of nuclear fuel debris—an already dangerously daunting task—all the more difficult.. “It appears that nuclear debris lies at an elevated place,” Fuketa said at a news conference earlier this month. “This will have a huge impact on the whole process of decommissioning work.” The latest alarming find is the result of an investigation that resumed in September after a five-year pause in which the NRA took new measurements of radiation levels around the shield plugs at the No. 2 and No. 3 reactors. Tokyo Electric Power Co., the operator of the plant, announced December 24 that nuclear fuel debris removal would be postponed until 2022 or later due to the coronavirus pandemic. As Common Dreams reported in October, Greenpeace and other environmental and anti-nuclear advocates expressed shock and outrage after the Japanese government announced a plan to release stored water from the ill-fated plant into the Pacific Ocean. Greenpeace subsequently released a report claiming that radioactive carbon-14 released into the ocean “has the potential to damage human DNA.” The Fukushima Daiichi disaster—the result of a 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed more than 15,000 people in northeastern Japan—was the worst nuclear incident since the 1986 Chernobyl meltdown in the former Soviet Union, and the worst in Japan since the United States waged a nuclear war against the country in 1945 that killed hundreds of thousands of people. |
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of the week– Nuclear Reactor Information Task Force
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
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