PM Modi, Vladimir Putin May Discuss Energy, Nuclear Issues At ‘No-Agenda’ Summit
With China, reducing the tension on the border was important but with Russia, a trusted all-weather partner, increasing trade ties and stepping up defence and atomic energy cooperation could be on agenda
All India NDTV by Pallava Bagla May 20, 2018 SOCHI, RUSSIA: The laid-back balmy weather of Sochi on the coast of the Black Sea is the ideal location where the first-ever informal summit will be held between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.
……. The meltdown of the Iranian nuclear deal after the US unilaterally pulled out of it would come up for sure, especially since India has ‘civilizational links’ with Iran. The patch up happening between North and South Korea over nuclear weapons is also going to be on the table. But closer home, atomic talks related to Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant are also likely to be part of the summit.
PM Modi is expected to reassert India’s avowed position of complete denuclearisation of these weapons of mass destruction from the world.
Indo-Russian atomic energy cooperation could also be reviewed at the highest level. Reports suggest that India has invested nearly $5 billion in the Russian energy sector. Bilateral civil nuclear co-operation could be very high on the agenda.
……… atomic experts say, discussion on the second site for the Russian Nuclear Park would be on the anvil. In the 2014 Indo-Russian ‘Strategic Vision’ document on nuclear cooperation, the two countries have committed themselves to building in all 16 nuclear reactors in the next two decades. In all, six reactors will come up at Kudankulam and the remaining six at another site.
Today, it seems the next set of six reactors could come up in Andhra Pradesh. It is hoped that later this year in October, at the proposed formal summit, the two countries will announce the allotment of the second nuclear park site to Russia.
……… The Indo-Russian nuclear deal is well worth over Rs. 4,50,000 crores and could be the mother of all deals.
It may be worth noting that as part of the agreement for the Indo-US Civilian Nuclear Deal, India has committed to buy 10,000 MW of reactors from USA and France. But unfortunately, both the French nuclear company Areva and the American atomic giant Westinghouse ran into financial trouble and declared bankruptcy, and the new owners are still taking charge in both the countries. In all possibility, India may not order either French or American reactors for the next three to four years till these ‘new technologies’ are safely operating.
n addition and not merely as a footnote, India’s maiden nuclear venture abroad in Bangladesh could also be discussed. At Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant, almost on the Indian border, Bangladesh is making two Russian-made 1200 MW reactors.
India is getting to partner in these Bangladeshi reactors by providing training to Bangladeshi atomic engineers at Indian reactor sites. The three countries have signed a tripartite nuclear agreement on Rooppur, confirmed Anwar Hussain, Secretary of the Ministry of Science and Technology in Dhaka, who spoke exclusively to NDTV on the sidelines of the 10th edition of the Atomexpo exhibition held at Sochi. At least 3,000 participants from 68 countries presented an upbeat picture of the global nuclear industry at the exhibition. https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/pm-modi-vladimir-putin-may-discuss-energy-nuclear-issues-at-no-agenda-summit-1854710
Russia building underwater nuclear drone that could cause TSUNAMIS as big as 2011 disaster
MOSCOW is in the process of constructing an underwater drone that can carry nuclear warheads, destroy naval bases and cause tsunamis, according to a Russian state news agency. Express UK, By CAITLIN DOHERTY18 May 18, A source told TASS news agency the Poseidon drone will be able to carry nuclear weapons of up to two megatonnes.
The drone will operate at under-sea depths of more than 1 kilometre, and will have a speed of between 60 and 70 knots.
The source said: “It will be possible to mount various nuclear shares on the ‘torpedo’ of the Poseidon multipurpose seaborne system, with the thermonuclear single warhead. They added it will “have the maximum capacity of up to two megatonnes in TNT equivalent”….
The Russian President said the machine would have “hardly any vulnerabilities” and would carry “massive nuclear ordinance”.
“There is simply nothing in the world capable of withstanding them.”
The name Poseidon was chosen after open voting on the Russia’s Defence Ministry website.
TASS news agency has not been able to confirm the information provided by the source.
One physicist has said a machine of this magnitude could cause as much damage as the tsunami that hit Japan in 2011.
Rex Richardson told Business Insider: “A well-placed nuclear weapon of yield in the range 20 MT to 50 MT near a sea coast could certainly couple enough energy to equal the 2011 tsunami, and perhaps much more.
World Nuclear News 16th May 2018 Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear corporation, yesterday signed a series of agreements with overseas companies during the Atomexpo conference and exhibition being held this week in Sochi, Russia. The agreements, with Chile, China, Cuba, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Italy, Kazakhstan, Saudi
Arabia, Serbia, Spain and Zambia, include the engineering and medical
sectors, among others. http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/C-Rosatom-expands-overseas-links-with-new-agreements-16051801.html
Rosatom, Russia’s state-controlled nuclear giant, has just launched the Akademik Lomonosov, the first of a fleet of floating nuclear power plants that Russia plans to build and sell to other countries such as China, Indonesia and Sudan. It is currently being towed across the Baltic Sea, where it will travel all of Scandinavia to Murmansk, to be supplied and tested, before departing on a 5,000 kilometre trip through the Arctic.
We already know the risks of drilling for oil in such a fragile and wild environment as the Arctic, but a nuclear reactor floating in its waters could aggravate things much more. This is why:
It is a matter of time that a catastrophe occurs
Rosatom has said that the plant “is designed with a large margin of safety that exceeds all possible threats and makes nuclear reactors indestructible in the face of tsunamis and other natural disasters.” Remember what happened the last time they said a boat was “unsinkable”?
Nothing is indestructible. The problem is that this nuclear Titanic has been built without independent experts to verify it. The same lack of supervision that there was in Chernobyl.
The flat bottom hull of this plant makes it especially vulnerable to tsunamis and cyclones. A large wave could launch the station to the coast. Also, he can not move alone either. If you release moorings, you can not move away from a threat (such as an iceberg or a strange vessel, for example) increasing the risk of a fatal incident. A collision shock would damage your vital functions, causing a loss of power and damaging your cooling function.
Imagine how difficult it would be to deal with the consequences
There are so many things that could go wrong here: it could flood, sink or run aground. All of these scenarios could lead to the release of radioactive substances into the environment.
In case of a collapse, the ocean water would cool the core. It may seem like a good idea, but when the fuel rods are melted with seawater, there would first be a water explosion and possible explosions of hydrogen that would propagate a large number of radioactive isotopes into the atmosphere.
Damage to the reactor could contaminate much of the marine wildlife that is nearby, which means that fish populations could be contaminated in the coming years. The radioactive Arctic is not the most beautiful scenario. The areas around Fukushima and Chernobyl are already difficult to clean, imagine in the polar night, with sub-zero temperatures and snowstorms.
The terrible trajectory of nuclear ships, icebreakers and Russian submarines
In Russia, there is a very long list of accidents with nuclear submarines and icebreakers.
The first nuclear icebreaker, Lenin, suffered a cooling accident in 1965, which caused a partial melting of the nucleus, which ended up pouring into the Tsivolki Bay near the Novaya Zemyla archipelago in 1967. In 1970, the reactor of a nuclear submarine ( K-320) was launched at the Krasnoye Sormovo pier in Russia, releasing large amounts of radiation and exposing hundreds of people. An accident during the fuel loading of a nuclear submarine reactor in Chazma in 1985 irradiated 290 workers, causing 10 deaths and 49 injured people. And the list goes on …
Rosatom’s plans to build a fleet of floating nuclear power plants pose an increased risk of unprecedented nuclear accidents in the Arctic.
A nuclear dump in the water
We already have enough radioactive waste without knowing what to do with them. We do not need more.
The reactors of this plant are smaller than those found in a nuclear power plant on land and will need to be refuelled every two or three years. The radioactive waste will be stored on board until it returns after the designated 12 years of operation. That means radioactive waste will be left floating in the Arctic for years.
This is not only incredibly dangerous, but there is still no safe place to transport the fuel used once you step on firm ground. No source of energy must generate waste that takes thousands of years to be safe.
Is using nuclear energy to facilitate the extraction of more fossil fuels
If this floating nightmare were not already absurd enough, the reason they are towing it to the Arctic is to help Russia extract more fossil fuels. Its main mission is to provide electricity to the northern oil, gas, coal and mineral extraction industries.
And it is not necessary to repeat the reasons why more fossil fuels are synonymous with more climate change. We only have to protect the Arctic from this potential catastrophe.
Responsible for the anti-nuclear campaign of Greenpeace Spain, Source: El Independiente
Guardian 9th May 2018 Chernobyl: History of a Tragedy by Serhii Plokhy review – Europe nearly
became uninhabitable. A compelling history of the 1986 disaster and its
aftermath presents Chernobyl as a terrifying emblem of the terminal decline
of the Soviet system. The turbine test that went catastrophically wrong was
not, he argues, a freak occurrence but a disaster waiting to happen. It had
deep roots in the party’s reckless obsession with production targets and
in the pliant nuclear industry’s alarming record of cutting corners to
cut costs. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/may/09/chernobyl-history-tragedy-serhii-plokhy-review-disaster-europe-soviet-system
Amsterdam, Netherlands – The “Akademik Lomonosov”, the world’s first floating nuclear power plant, has this morning left St. Petersburg and will be towed through Estonian, Danish, Swedish and Norwegian waters towards Murmansk, warned Greenpeace.
The floating nuclear power plant was initially supposed to be loaded with nuclear fuel and tested on site in the centre of St. Petersburg. However, due to pressure from the Baltic states and a successful petition organised by Greenpeace Russia, Rosatom, the state-controlled nuclear giant that owns and operates the floating nuclear power plant, decided on 21 July 2017 to move loading and testing to Murmansk.
“To test a nuclear reactor in a densely populated area like the centre of St. Petersburg is irresponsible to say the least. However, moving the testing of this ‘nuclear Titanic’ away from the public eye will not make it less so: Nuclear reactors bobbing around the Arctic Ocean will pose a shockingly obvious threat to a fragile environment which is already under enormous pressure from climate change,” said Jan Haverkamp, nuclear expert for Greenpeace Central and Eastern Europe.
Having reached Murmansk, a city of 300,000, the “Akademik Lomonosov” — first in a series of floating nuclear plants planned — will be fuelled, tested and, in 2019, towed 5,000 km through the Northern Sea Route and put to use near Pevek, in the Chukotka Region.
According to Russian media, Rosatom is currently planning a production line, which will be capable of mass producing floating nuclear reactors. Backed by its owner, the Russian State, the company has already been in talks with potential buyers in Africa, Latin America and South East Asia.
“This hazardous venture is not just a threat to the Arctic, but, potentially, to other densely populated or vulnerable natural regions too,” said Jan Haverkamp.
There are indications that 15 countries, including China, Algeria, Indonesia, Malaysia and Argentina, have shown an interest in hiring floating nuclear plants. Among other purposes, the floating nuclear plant is intended to provide power for oil and gas exploration.
“The floating nuclear power plants will typically be put to use near coastlines and shallow water. Contrary to claims regarding safety, the flat-bottomed hull and the floating nuclear power plant’s lack of self-propulsion makes it particularly vulnerable to tsunamis and cyclones,” said Jan Haverkamp.
Akademik Lomonosov, the world’s first floating nuclear power plant, left the Baltic Shipyard in St Petersburg on Saturday morning.
It is expected to reach the Swedish coast next week, before making its way through the narrow Öresund straits, across the Kattegat and into the North Sea.
“We are following this closely through our cooperation with other countries and through our own national agencies,” Johan Friberg, Director of the Swedish Radiation Safety Agency told Sweden’s state broadcaster SVT.
Russia’s development of a floating nuclear power plant has generated alarm among its Nordic neighbours, with Norway’s foreign minister Børge Brende last June warning that the plan to transport it fully fuelled raised “serious questions”.
Karolina Skog, Sweden’s environment minister, argued last June that floating nuclear power stations created “a new type of risk”.
“It is important that Russia makes every effort to fulfil the criteria of international agreements, which should be seen as applying to floating nuclear power stations as well,” she said.
After a meeting in Moscow that July, Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom relented on its plans to drag the reactor through the Baltic fuelled, saying that the plant would instead be fuelled in Murmansk after it had arrived in the Russian Arctic.
“We will carry out the transportation through the Baltic and the Scandinavian region without nuclear fuel on board,” Alexey Likhachev told the Independent Barents Observer.
Jan Haverkamp, nuclear expert for Greenpeace Central and Eastern Europe, has attacked the plant as a ‘nuclear Titanic’, and “threat to the Arctic”
“Nuclear reactors bobbing around the Arctic Ocean will pose a shockingly obvious threat to a fragile environment which is already under enormous pressure from climate change,” he said in a press release.
After the plant is fuelled and tested, it will be pulled across to Pevek on the Eastern Siberian Sea, where it will be used to power oil rigs.
Energy Live News 19th April 2018 ,The boss of ROSATOM in Europe has told ELN the future for nuclear power is
all about communication. Andrey Rozhdestvin was very open and direct when I
spoke to him earlier this week in Madrid, where the Russian nuclear giant
ROSATOM was launching its partnership with National Geographic, sponsoring
a series of new wildlife documentaries.
It’s one its ways of trying to trigger public dialogue on the issue of nuclear power. ROSATOM says the
documentaries will be talking about how to tackle climate change and they
of course believe nuclear energy, which is carbon-free generation, is part
of the answer. https://www.energylivenews.com/2018/04/19/talk-to-the-people-says-russian-nuclear-chief/
World War 3 IMMINENT! Scared ex-Soviet general warns NUCLEAR war is INEVITABLE
A SCARED former Russian army general issued a harrowing warning that a nuclear war is “inevitable” and it is an “illusion” if leaders feel they can control a military conflict between the US and Russia. Express UKBy THOMAS HUNT, Apr 17, 2018 Former Russian general: Use of nuclear weapons is inevitable
Evgeny Buzhinskiy, a retired Lieutenant-General, claimed the Cold War was rather comfortable in comparison to the current conflict and the West should be prepared because Vladimir Putin “will not accept defeat” if World War 3 started.
Speaking to Channel 4 News, he said: “I think it’s worse than the Cold War, which we have been waging for 40 years after the Second World War.
“In the Cold War time I was in the armed forces and I was quite comfortable I’d say.
“There were definite duels and definite red lines – everybody knew what to do.There were no threats, no sanctions, no isolation, no cornering, no nothing.
“There was just ideological confrontation, but people on both sides knew how far they could go.”
The military veteran was then asked by the presenter whether rising tensions could lead to a third world war.
The General responded: “Of course. I repeat, you cannot control military confrontation between Russia and the United States.
Of course Russia cannot wage a war against the United States. For years, economically it cannot.
“In the general purpose forces, we are a bit lagging behind the United States.
“And of course, Russia will no accept any kind of defeat.
“So the involvement of nuclear weapons is inevitable.”
When asked if he is just trying to scare viewers, Mr Buzhinskiy said he was scared for the possible repercussions. He added: “I am scared myself because I have children and I have grandchildren so I am scared for their fate.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin warns of global ‘chaos’ if West strikes Syria again, ABC News 16 Apr 18, Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that further Western attacks on Syria would bring chaos to world affairs, as Washington prepared to increase pressure on Russia with new economic sanctions.
Key points:
Vladimir Putin said further attacks on Syria will bring “chaos” in world affairs
America accused Russia of blocking attempts to investigate Syria’s chemical weapons capabilities
New sanctions against Russia will target companies linked to Syria
In a telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani, Mr Putin and Mr Rouhani agreed the Western strikes had damaged the chances of achieving a political resolution in the seven-year Syria conflict, according to a Kremlin statement.
“Vladimir Putin, in particular, stressed that if such actions committed in violation of the UN Charter continue, then it will inevitably lead to chaos in international relations,” the Kremlin statement said.
Syria: US, British and French forces launch air strikes in response to chemical weapons attack,
US, British and French forces have pounded chemical weapons sites in Syria with air strikes in response to an alleged poison gas attack that killed dozens in the rebel-held town of Douma last week.
Key points:
US, UK and France hit three chemical weapons sites in Syria
US Defence Secretary says strikes were a “one-time shot”
Strikes biggest intervention yet by Western powers against Assad regime
In a televised address to the nation, US President Donald Trump said the three nations had “marshalled their righteous power against barbarism and brutality”.
The strikes were the biggest intervention by Western powers against President Bashar al-Assad in the country’s seven-year-old civil war, which has pitted the US and its allies against Russia.
The Pentagon said the strikes targeted a research centre in Damascus, along with a chemical weapons storage facility and command post west of Homs……
British Prime Minister Theresa May said the strikes were not about intervening in a civil war nor were they about a regime change.
“We cannot allow the use of chemical weapons to become normalised within Syria, on the streets of the UK or anywhere else in our world,” Ms May said…….
Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan to launch Turkey’s first nuclear power plant, ABC News, 3 Apr 18 The leaders of Russia and Turkey are scheduled to launch the start of the construction of Turkey’s first nuclear power plant as ties between the countries deepen.
Russia’s Vladimir Putin, on his first foreign visit since re-election on March 18, arrived in Ankara on Tuesday for talks with Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The two will remotely launch the construction of the Russian-made Akkuyu nuclear plant on the Mediterranean coast.
Russia Almost Brought Back a Terrifying Weapon: Nuclear ICBM’s on Trains, National Interest Robert Beckhusen, 3 Apr 18,
In October 1987, the first rail ICBM became operational in the form of the “Moldets,” a train armed with a 77-foot-long RT-23 — a type of ICBM which was also stored in silos — carrying 10 multiple-reentry warheads with 550 kilotons of explosive power each. In the 1990s and 2000s after the START II treaty, Russia decommissioned these missiles, which NATO referred to as the SS-23 Scalpel. The Kremlin produced 12 of these trains.
In 2013, the Russian military announced it would bring back rail-mobile intercontinental ballistic missiles. In other words, trains with big nukes crammed inside, capable of darting around Russia, raising their launchers and firing at a moment’s notice. It was called Barguzin and would begin testing in 2019.
That was the idea. In December 2017, the Russian government put the Barguzin project on hiatus, saving the world from the specter of doomsday trains roaming Siberia. The ostensible reason — the weapon is too expensive, according to Rossiyskaya Gazeta, the government’s paper of record.
The Barguzin project was a revival of a retired leg of the Soviet Union’s ground-based nuclear “triad.” While the Soviets had nuke-equipped submarines and nuclear-armed bombers, its ground-based component had nuclear missiles mounted on huge trucks, inside underground silos and on trains. The Soviet military first signed the order for the creation of rail-mobile ICBMs in 1969, but the launchers came later.
In October 1987, the first rail ICBM became operational in the form of the “Moldets,” a train armed with a 77-foot-long RT-23 — a type of ICBM which was also stored in silos — carrying 10 multiple-reentry warheads with 550 kilotons of explosive power each. In the 1990s and 2000s after the START II treaty, Russia decommissioned these missiles, which NATO referred to as the SS-23 Scalpel. The Kremlin produced 12 of these trains.
And that was the end of Russia’s rail-mobile missiles until the Kremlin announced in 2013 that it would create a new nuke-armed train under the moniker Barguzin, or BZhRK, this time equipped with the more advanced RS-24 Yars ICBM.
The RS-24 has a similar range to the RT-23 but is three meters shorter and weighs half as much — a considerable advantage for mobile missiles. The RS-24 is also, by the way, road-mobile.
……….During peacetime they require a network of bases for storage and maintenance, where international treaties require them to stay, and extensive security detachments to protect the missiles when they move during wartime. And they’re still stuck on railroad tracks — so U.S. spies have a general idea of where to look.
Which also begs the question as to whether the nuclear-war trains could even make it out of their bases in time before incoming missiles hit in the opening minutes of a nuclear war. Sure enough, the Pentagon studied the issue during the Cold War, and even built two prototype train cars intended for the Peacekeeper ICBM, but found them to be not worth the cost and rather vulnerable……. http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/russia-almost-brought-back-terrifying-weapon-nuclear-icbms-25193
Russia just tested its ‘Satan’ nuclear missile amid Putin and Trump taunting an arms race, Business Insider, ALEX LOCKIEMAR 30, 2018, Russia says it has tested a new nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile; Russian President Vladimir Putin has said the missile can defeat any US missile defences.
Russia on Friday said it had tested a new type of nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile known by NATO as the “Satan 2.”
The country’s president, Vladimir Putin, has said the missile can defeat any US missile defences amid growing talk of an arms race with the US and President Donald Trump.
And the feeling of nuclear inadequacy may be mutual.
This is how you get an arms race Putin’s nuclear chest-thumping “really got under the president’s skin,” according to a White House official cited by NBC News on Thursday.
On a recent phone call between the two leaders, which made headlines for Trump’s decision to congratulate Putin on his less-than-democratic reelection, Trump and Putin reportedly butted heads.
“If you want to have an arms race, we can do that, but I’ll win,” Trump told him, according to NBC.
Putin said in his address that Russia was working on more and more-varied nuclear weapon delivery systems than the US. Trump has also planned a few new nuclear weapons for the US, but they show a very different philosophy.
In 1989, Russia Left a Nuclear Submarine Dead in the Ocean (Armed with Nuclear Weapons) National Interest , Kyle Mizokami , 27 Mar 18
Komsomolets sank in 5,250 feet of water, complete with its nuclear reactor and two nuclear-armed Shkval torpedoes. Between 1989 and 1998 seven expeditions were carried out to secure the reactor against radioactive release and seal the torpedo tubes. Russian sources allege that during these visits, evidence of “unauthorized visits to the sunken submarine by foreign agents” were discovered.
In the mid-1980s, the Soviet Union constructed a super submarine unlike any other. Fast and capable of astounding depths for a combat submersible, the submarine Komsomolets was introduced in 1984, heralded as a new direction for the Soviet Navy.
Five years later, Komsomolets and its nuclear weapons were on the bottom of the ocean, two-thirds of its crew killed by what was considered yet another example of Soviet incompetence.
The history of the Komsomolets goes as far back as 1966. A team at the Rubin Design Bureau under N. A. Klimov and head designer Y. N. Kormilitsin was instructed to begin research into a Project 685, a deep-diving submarine. The research effort dragged on for eight years, likely due to a lack of a suitable metal that could withstand the immense pressures of the deep. In 1974, however, the double-hulled design was completed, with a titanium alloy chosen for the inner hull.
Project 685, also known as K-278, was to be a prototype boat to test future deep-diving Soviet submarines. The Sevmash shipyard began construction on April 22, 1978 and the ship was officially completed on May 30, 1983. The difficulty in machining titanium contributed to the unusually long construction period.
K-278 was 360 feet long and forty feet wide, with the inner hull approximately twenty-four feet wide. It had a submerged displacement of 6,500 tons, and the use of titanium instead of steel made it notably lighter. It had a unique double hull, with the inner hull made of titanium, that gave it its deep-diving capability. The inner hull was further divided into seven compartments, two of which were reinforced to create a safe zone for the crew, and an escape capsule was built into the sail to allow the crew to abandon ship while submerged at depths of up to 1,500 meters.
……….On April 7, 1989, while operating a depth of 1266 feet, Komsomolets ran into trouble in the middle of the Norwegian Sea. According to Norman Polmar and Kenneth Moore, it was the submarine’s second crew, newly trained in operating the ship. Furthermore, its origins as a test ship meant it lacked a damage-control party.
A fire broke out in the seventh aft chamber, and the flames burned out an air supply valve, which fed pressurized air into the fire. Fire suppression measures failed. The reactor was scrammed and the ballast tanks were blown to surface the submarine. The fire continued to spread, and the crew fought the fire for six hours before the order to abandon ship was given.
………. Only four men had been killed in the incident so far, but after the submarine sank many men succumbed to the thirty-six-degree (Fahrenheit) water temperatures. After an hour the fishing boats Alexi Khlobystov and Oma arrived and rescued thirty men, some of whom later succumbed to their injuries. Of the original sixty-nine men on board the submarine when disaster struck, forty-two died, including Captain First Rank Vanin.
Komsomolets sank in 5,250 feet of water, complete with its nuclear reactor and two nuclear-armed Shkval torpedoes. Between 1989 and 1998 seven expeditions were carried out to secure the reactor against radioactive release and seal the torpedo tubes. Russian sources allege that during these visits, evidence of “unauthorized visits to the sunken submarine by foreign agents” were discovered.
Kyle Mizokami is a defense and national security writer based in San Francisco who has appeared in the Diplomat, Foreign Policy, War is Boring and the Daily Beast. In 2009 he cofounded the defense and security blog Japan Security Watch. You can follow him on Twitter: @KyleMizokami.
Ensaf Haidar, wife of Raif Badawi, who was sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes for “insulting Islam”
Saudi Arabia is one of approximately thirty countries in the world with judicial corporal punishment. In Saudi Arabia’s case this includes amputations of hands and feet for robbery, and flogging for lesser crimes such as “sexual deviance” and drunkenness. In the 2000s, it was reported that women were sentenced to lashes for adultery; the women were actually victims of rape, but because they could not prove who the perpetrators were, they were deemed guilty of committing adultery.[5] The number of lashes is not clearly prescribed by law and is varied according to the discretion of judges, and ranges from dozens of lashes to several hundreds, usually applied over a period of weeks or months. In 2004, the United Nations Committee Against Torture criticized Saudi Arabia over the amputations and floggingsit carries out under Sharia. The Saudi delegation responded defending “legal traditions” held since the inception of Islam 1,400 years ago and rejected interference in its legal system.
The courts continue to impose sentences of flogging as a principal or additional punishment for many offences. At least five defendants were sentenced to flogging of 1,000 to 2,500 lashes. Flogging was carried out in prisons
In 2009, Mazen Abdul-Jawad was sentenced to 1,000 lashes and five years in prison for bragging on a Saudi TV show about his sexual exploits.[7][8]
In 2014, Saudi blogger Raif Badawi‘s sentence was increased to 1,000 lashes and ten years’ imprisonment after he was accused of apostasy in 2012. The lashes were due to take place over 20 weeks. The first round (50) were administered on January 9, 2015, but the second round has been postponed due to medical problems. The case was internationally condemned and put a considerable amount of pressure on the Saudi legal system.
In October 2015,UK pensioner and cancer victim Karl Andree, then 74, faced[when?] 360 lashes for home brewing alcohol. His family feared the punishment could kill him. However, he was released and returned home in November that year.[9]
In 2016, a Saudi man was sentenced to 2,000 lashes, ten years in prison and the fine of 20,000 riyals($5,300) for making tweets critical of Islam, and denying the existence of God.[10][11]
While Saudi Arabia’s Criminal Procedure Code prohibits “torture” and “undignified treatment” (art. 2) in practice torture and using torture to extract forced confessions of guilt remains common.
According to Amnesty International, security forces continued to torture and ill- treat detainees to extract confessions to be used as evidence against them at trial. According to the organization, 32 defendants accused of spying for Iran were subjected to torture and forced to confess. Detainees were held incommunicado and denied access to their families.[18]
Saudi Arabia engages in capital punishment, including public executions by beheading.[19] The death penalty can be imposed for a wide range of offences[20] including murder, rape, armed robbery, repeated drug use, apostasy,[21] adultery,[22] witchcraft and sorcery[23] and can be carried out by beheading with a sword,[21]stoning or firing squad,[22] followed by crucifixion.[23] In 2005 there were 191 executions, in 2006 there were 38, in 2007 there were 153, and in 2008 there were 102.[24]………
Saudi women face discrimination in many aspects of their lives, such as the justice system. Although they make up 70% of those enrolled in universities, for social reasons, women make up 5% of the workforce in Saudi Arabia,[33] the lowest proportion in the world. The treatment of women has been referred to as “sex segregation“[34][35] and “gender apartheid“.[36][37] Implementation of a government resolution supporting expanded employment opportunities for women met resistance from within the labor ministry,[38] from the religious police,[39] and from the male citizenry.[40]
In many parts of Saudi Arabia, it is believed that a woman’s place is in the home caring for her husband and family, yet there are some women who do not adhere to this view and practice, and some run the house instead of the husband himself. Moreover, there is also some type of segregation at homes, such as different entrances for men and women.[41]
Women’s rights are at the heart of calls for reform in Saudi Arabia – calls that are challenging the kingdom’s political status quo.[41] Local and international women’s groups are also pushing governments to respond, taking advantage of the fact that some rulers are eager to project a more progressive image to the West…….more .https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Saudi_Arabia
Report: Saudi prince said Kushner is ‘in his pocket’
