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Starmer’s role in Assange’s persecution

As head of the UK Crown Prosecution Service, the newly elected British PM Keir Starmer played a key role in setting in motion the infernal legal machinery that crushed Assange for 14 years

THOMAS FAZI, JUL 05, 2024,  https://www.thomasfazi.com/p/starmers-role-in-assanges-persecution
Even though Julian Assange was finally freed last month, after a 14-year-long ordeal, many myths still endure about the whole affair. One of these is that the case concerning Assange’s alleged rape of two girls in Sweden, in 2010, never went to trial because Assange evaded justice. In reality, Assange, who was then in the UK, made himself available for questioning via several means, by telephone or video conference, or in person in the Australian embassy. But the Swedish authorities insisted on questioning him in Sweden. Assange’s legal team countered that extradition of a suspect simply to question him — not to send him to trial, as he had not been charged — was a disproportionate measure.

This was more than a technicality: Assange feared that if he were extradited to Sweden, the latter’s authorities would extradite him to the US, where he had good reason to believe that he wouldn’t be given a fair trial. Sweden, after all, always refused to provide Assange a guarantee of non-extradition to the US — the reason why, when in 2012 the British Supreme Court ruled that he should be extradited to Sweden, Assange sought political asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy. From there, however, he continued to make known his availability to be interrogated by the Swedish authorities inside the embassy, but they never replied.

Thanks to a FOIA investigation by the Italian journalist Stefania Maurizi, it would later emerge that a crucial role in getting Sweden to pursue this highly unusual line of conduct was played by the UK Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), the principal public agency for conducting criminal prosecutions, then led by one Keir Starmer. In early 2011, while Assange was still under house arrest, Paul Close, a British lawyer with the CPS, gave his Swedish counterparts his opinion on the case, apparently not for the first time. “My earlier advice remains, that in my view it would not be prudent for the Swedish authorities to try to interview the defendant in the UK”, Close wrote. Why did the Crown Prosecution Service advise the Swedes against the only legal strategy that could have brought the case to a rapid resolution, namely questioning Julian Assange in London, rather than insisting on his extradition?

In hindsight, it seems clear that the CPS’s aim was precisely that of keeping the case in a legal limbo, and Assange trapped in Britain, for as long as possible, especially considering how shaky the case against Assange was in the first place. After all, what better outcome for Assange’s enemies than keeping him under investigation for years, suspected of being a rapist but never either charged or cleared once and for all, thus justifying his arbitrary detention? The CPS’s hostile treatment of Assange, the citizen of an allied country, continued even after he sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy, for example by insisting on denying him “safe passage” in UK territory in order to be treated in a hospital for a shoulder problem.

A year after Assange had taken refuge in the embassy, it appears that the Swedish prosecutor was considering dropping the extradition proceedings, but she was deterred from doing so by the CPS. The prosecutor was concerned, among other things, about the mounting costs of costs of the Scotland Yard agents guarding the embassy day and night. But for the British authorities this was not a problem; they replied that they “do not consider costs are a relevant factor in this matter”.

As a result of the Swedish authorities’ highly unusual behaviour, Assange had, by then, been arbitrarily and illegitimately forced into detention for seven years, as was concluded even by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention.

What role, if any, did Keir Starmer play in all this as head of the CPS? During the period when the body was overseeing Assange’s extradition to Sweden, Starmer made several trips to Washington. US records show Starmer met with Attorney General Eric Holder and a host of American and British national security officials. Using the Freedom of Information Act, the British media organisation Declassified UK requested the itinerary for each of Starmer’s four trips to Washington with details of his official meetings, including any briefing notes. CPS replied that all the documents relative to Starmer’s trips to Washington had been destroyed. Asked for clarification — and whether the destruction of documents was routine — the CPS did not respond. 

Similarly, when Maurizi submitted a FOIA request to the CPS to shed light on the correspondence between Paul Close and the Swedish authorities, she was also told that all the data associated with Paul Close’s account had been deleted when he retired and could not be recovered. This only beckoned more questions: why did the CPS destroy key documents on a high-profile, ongoing case? And what did the CPS destroy exactly, and on whose instructions? The CPS added that Close’s email account had been deleted “in accordance with standard procedure”. However, Maurizi would later discover that this procedure was by no means standard. The destruction of key emails was distinctly suspicious.

Since then, Maurizi has been waging a years-long legal fight to access documents related to the CPS and Assange case, but she has been systematically stonewalled by CPS — even despite a judge order ordering the CPS to come clean about the destruction of key documents on Assange. One cannot help but wonder: what are they trying to hide? It’s hard to shake the conclusion that the real purpose of the Swedish investigation, and of CPS’s unusual behaviour, was simply to keep Assange detained for as long as necessary to get him extradited to the US.

Now that one of the key people behind all this has just been elected prime minister, it’s even less likely that we’ll ever learn the truth. Indeed, one cannot help but wonder if releasing Assange just before the election wasn’t a way — for Starmer and everyone else involved — to make this story go away once and for all.

July 8, 2024 Posted by | politics, UK | Leave a comment

Europe is Quietly Debating a Nuclear Future Without the US

America has protected Europe with is nuclear umbrella for more than 70 years. In the era of Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, the continent is quietly debating a different nuclear future.

Politico, By LAURA KAYALI, THORSTEN JUNGHOLT and PHILIPP FRITZ, 07/04/2024
In a castle near Stockholm, standing on a blue-curtained podium that hid the room’s gilt mirrors and sparkling chandeliers, French President Emmanuel Macron ripped open a debate that Europe had been avoiding not just for years but for decades. 

Macron had chosen the time and place carefully; he was on a state visit to Sweden, one of the long-neutral European countries who decided in 2022 to join NATO in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He was sharing the stage with Sweden’s king and prime minister, and faced an audience of Swedish military cadets and officers who were recalibrating their mission and ideas about their country’s, and the continent’s, security. It was the last week of January, and Sweden’s final ratification as a NATO member was just weeks away. And he spoke in English, to make sure people outside of France and Sweden paid attention. 

During the Cold War, Macron noted, “all the treaties were decided by the former USSR and USA. Everything that covered our territory was decided by the big guys in the room, not by the Europeans themselves.” Going forward, he said, looking around the audience to make sure his point was getting across, in the area of arms control, troop deployments and the entirety of Europe’s security architecture, that needs to change. “We have to be the one to decide,” Macron said.

The room of military officers was quiet. Macron hadn’t used the word “nuclear,” but he didn’t have to. A Swedish officer stood up and asked if France, as “the only EU country with an independent nuclear force,” had a “special responsibility” to protect the security of the continent’s northernmost region, the Arctic sea passage. In other words, was France prepared to use its nuclear weapons if Scandinavian countries were threatened from the north, presumably from Russia’s bases in the Arctic.?

“Definitely yes,” Macron responded without hesitation, as if he anticipated the question. “Part of our vital interest has a European dimension, which gives us a special responsibility, given precisely what we have and the deterrence capacity we have,” he added. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Recently, Trump has been downplaying his threat to pull back from NATO, saying that he’ll keep the United States in NATO “100 percent.” But every time, he is still quick to add conditions on U.S. participation, including that allies keep up defense spending and “play fair.”

Both European and U.S. experts say it’s unlikely a Trump administration would decide to physically take out the nukes stationed in Europe. But nuclear deterrence depends on political credibility, and there’s an unspoken fear in Europe that Trump would be less willing to come to the aid of European allies than his predecessors. Would Putin be so confident that Trump would be willing to risk a nuclear war to save Estonia? 

“The French and the British are going to have to think about their nuclear posture if Trump is elected and if he makes good on his threat to disengage from NATO,” said Daniel Fried, a former U.S. ambassador to Poland.

“It’s the first time since the 1960s that European countries have to question the American umbrella,” he added. 

Macron’s ambitions for France’s nuclear deterrent haven’t exactly been a hit with his constituents, with far-right and far-left parties accusing him of selling out France’s sovereignty to the Europeans. But that hasn’t stopped him from continuing to promote the idea, mentioning it three more times in just the last few months.

Macron hasn’t provided many specifics about how exactly this arsenal would cover Europe, but has made clear that France would remain fully in charge: “It’s the President of the Republic as head of the armed forces who defines the engagement of this nuclear force in all its components and who defines France’s vital interests,” he told The Economist. “It’s not a question of changing that.” …………………………………………………………….

For its part, France has about 290 warheads, but is not a member of the NPG. In comparison, the U.S. has more than 5,000 nukes and Russia 5,580, according to a study by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. 

At all times, London and Paris each have at least one nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarine patrolling the seas. A few days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Paris deployed three (out of four) submarines at the same time — an unprecedented level of alert. ……………………………………………………

It’s fair to say that quite a few European countries think that by reopening the debate over its nuclear umbrella, Europe has far more to lose than to gain. Chief among them is Germany, which has a history of saying no thank you to nuclear pushes from French presidents. …………………………………………………………………………………..


At least for now, the future of Europe’s conversation on nuclear deterrence depends on several high-stakes elections. Citizens from NATO’s three nuclear powers — the United States, the United Kingdom and France — are all going to the polls this year and NATO- and Euro-skeptics could soon be wielding power in both Paris and Washington.

That’s one reason why the topic is unlikely to be aired openly during the gathering of NATO leaders that will take place in Washington from July 9 to 11. “I do not expect European nuclear defense to be much of a topic at the summit,” one European diplomat said, “rather NATO will again affirm its deterrence and defense.”………………………….. more https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/07/04/europe-us-nuclear-weapons-00166070

July 7, 2024 Posted by | EUROPE, weapons and war | Leave a comment

‘Letters of last resort’: deciding response to a nuclear attack among first of Starmer’s tasks

The handwritten instructions new PMs write for Trident submarine commanders contain instructions for what to do if Britain’s leaders are killed

Guardian Dan Sabbagh 5 July 24


ometime soon after entering Downing Street as prime minister, Keir Starmer will be briefed on the deadly capability of Britain’s nuclear deterrent – and asked to consider what instructions to give Trident submarine commanders in the unlikely event the UK is destroyed in an all-out attack and he is among the millions killed.

In the aftermath of an election victory, it is a sobering moment. Tony Blair is described as having gone “quite quiet” just over a quarter of a century ago when asked to handwrite four identical “letters of last resort” to the commanders in the event that the UK no longer in effect exists.

James Strong, a senior lecturer at Queen Mary, University of London, said the exercise acted as a counterweight to the drama of staying up all night, winning an election and visiting the monarch. “This is the moment where prime ministers say the reality of the job dawns on them, and that may be a reason why it keeps being done in this way”……………

While the previous Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was personally opposed to Trident, Starmer has already signalled he supports it – and would if necessary fire nuclear missiles. “We have to be prepared” to unleash the deterrent’s destructive power, the new prime minister said last month, describing it as “a vital part of our defence.”

The briefing is led by Adm Tony Radakin, the head of the armed forces, accompanied by what one former Downing Street official described as “stern-faced admirals in improbably grey suits”

There are about 40 warheads on every Vanguard submarine that carries the Trident missiles, though the exact number is a secret and may be slightly higher. Each is estimated to have an explosive power of 100 kilotons, according to David Cullen of the Nuclear Information Service – theoretically powerful enough to cause serious blast damage in a 3km radius.

In a time of war, it would fall to the prime minister (or if he or she were unavailable or dead, a nominated alternative whose identity is not disclosed) to authorise a nuclear attack.

The letters to the four commanders are handwritten, not necessarily immediately but relatively promptly. There are considered to be four basic options: retaliate; do nothing; join forces with an allied nation, probably the US; and even leave the matter to the commander’s discretion. “Taking the last option really would be passing the buck,” Strong said.

Once written, the letters are sealed in an envelope, and can only be delivered physically. Soon after, they are deposited in what one former Trident commander described as a “safe within a safe” in each of the submarines. There has been a British nuclear-armed submarine at sea on patrol at all times since 1969.

Meanwhile, Sunak’s instructions to the submarine on patrol remain in force, until a new boat has gone out with one of Starmer’s letters. Once no longer needed, the old prime minister’s instructions are destroyed, and what they have said has never been publicly disclosed, to maintain an aura of uncertainty.

Navy insiders say a complex verification process exists before a letter can be opened, which requires determining whether the UK has been subject to an all-out nuclear attack. That involves listening for signals from home – which back in the 1960s could only come from Radio 4 and other longwave radio stations – but today comes from a wide variety of sources, including mobile phones, GPS and shipping radio.

It is also likely there would be world news, listened to at sea, describing a dramatic escalation of global tensions. “You might expect that the level of ‘proof’ which the commanding officer would be required to amass before opening the PM’s letter to be extremely high, and so it is,” one former navy submarine commander said.  https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/05/letters-of-last-resort-deciding-response-to-a-nuclear-attack-among-first-of-starmers-tasks

July 7, 2024 Posted by | politics, UK | Leave a comment

The commissioning of the Flamanville EPR, nuclear reactor is proving difficult

 The commissioning of the Flamanville EPR, decided by the ASN on 7 May
2024, is proving difficult. This is not surprising when we remember the
many problems that this reactor has accumulated since the start of its
construction.

As Global Chance has repeatedly pointed out, there is a great
risk of seeing political imperatives take precedence over scientific rigour
and safety culture. The way in which information on commissioning is being
disseminated is worrying and does not in any way meet the conditions
stipulated by the ASN in its decision to authorise commissioning.

The next step, namely the search for criticality and the first divergence, is
crucial. Hasty implementation could prove problematic for the integrity of
the reactor and would put local populations at risk. This note is to be
updated regularly depending on the situation and the availability of
information relating to the EPR start-up operations.

 Global Chance 4th July 2024

https://global-chance.org/Laborieuse-mise-en-service-de-l-EPR-de-Flamanville

July 7, 2024 Posted by | France, technology | Leave a comment

Work to show UK nuclear ‘environmentally sustainable’ incomplete, 16 months after government announcement.

Stop Sizewell C executive director and company secretary Alison Downes believes labelling nuclear as green was a ploy to allow investors to justify their investment in the project. 

04 JUL, 2024 BY THOMAS JOHNSON,  https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/work-to-show-nuclear-environmentally-sustainable-incomplete-16-months-after-government-announcement-04-07-2024/

Government work to justify classifying nuclear energy generation as “environmentally sustainable” cannot be produced as it is incomplete, despite ex-chancellor Jeremy Hunt making the announcement in the 2023 Spring Budget, NCE can reveal.

NCE submitted a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) requesting all the documentation that was produced to back Hunt’s claim, but was refused because it is “still in the course of being completed”. 

In March 2023 during the Spring Budget statement, Hunt announced the government would be consulting on listing nuclear energy as “environmentally sustainable” in a bid to increase private investment in the sector. 

Hunt stated nuclear was a “critical source of cheap and reliable energy” to meeting the UK’s net zero obligations. 

On the reclassification of nuclear energy, the government’s budget document stated: “Nuclear energy will also be included in the green taxonomy, subject to consultation, encouraging private investment.” 

DESNZ’s reasoning for not responding to the FOI is due to the fact it has not completed the consultation as to whether it should go ahead with its plans to deem nuclear as “environmentally sustainable” which it started 16 months ago.  

DESNZ stated that it “does hold information in scope of this request, however we will not be releasing this at this time as it is covered by exemption 12(4)(d) which states ‘a public authority may refuse to disclose information to the extent that the request relates to material which is still in the course of completion, to unfinished documents or to incomplete data’. Your request falls within the scope of this provision because the requested information relates to material still in the course of completion”. 

It continued: “In order to apply the exemption detailed above we must also consider whether withholding such information is within the public interest. The consultation document to which the requested information relates has not been published, meaning the policy pertaining to the content of the consultation document is not finalised. For this reason, we feel it would not be in the public interest to release the information at this time.” 

In its Mobilising green investment: 2023 green finance strategy document related to the consultation for nuclear to be included within the green taxonomy, it states the government intended to consult on this in autumn last year. 

It further stated the consultation and getting this policy through was a priority that would be achieved by Q1 of this year. 

Reaction

Stop Sizewell C executive director and company secretary Alison Downes believes labelling nuclear as green was a ploy to allow investors to justify their investment in the project. 

She said: “The green taxonomy seems to be the final piece of the puzzle because the whole emphasis behind adopting the RAB model was to coax non-typical investors, like UK pension funds. 

“Obviously the theory behind labelling nuclear as green would allow them to tick another environmental, social and governance (ESG) box that would enable them to justify the investment.” 

Downes hypothesises that the reason behind the policy review not being completed yet could be due to the fact that Sizewell C’s recent attempt at leveraging private capital for the project in Spetember last year didn’t bring forward any atypical investors. 

“If investors have an appetite for nuclear then great but if they don’t, this isn’t going to tip the balance,” she said. 

“In our regular engagement with government officials they kept saying it’s coming, it’s coming, which in government speak it is ‘in due course’, which means sometime soon, maybe never. 

“It was very much plugged for Q1 this year and then it didn’t happen. 

“I wonder whether the fact they launched the capital raise last September where they had to get bidders to go through the pre-qualification process and it was apparent that very few were from that target market.  

“Suddenly they mave have thought if we’ve got a lot on our plate, is it a priority to push this taxonomy review through?” 

UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLAs) secretary Richard Outram said it is astounding that the government was unable to come up with any justification for making the claim back in March 2023. 

He said: “It is notable that even now 16 months after Jeremy Hunt claimed that nuclear is a ‘sustainable and environmentally friendly energy generation solution’ that officials in the DESNZ despite their resources, are unable to come up with the justification that underlines this claim.  

“That says a lot.” 

Stop Sizewell C and other anti-nuclear groups maintain that nuclear is not a environmentally energy generation solution due to the waste it creates, its contamination of the earth and other nature surrounding the power plants and the highly emission intensive methods of decommissioning old plants. 

Outram continued: “The NFLAs believe that nuclear is simply too costly (Hinkley Point C’s original budget was £18bn now current real budget is £46bn and rising), too slow (Hinkley Point C was meant to be generating power to cook turkeys in time for christmmas 2017 but will now be 2031 earliest), always comes with the possibility of an accident, always cause environmental contamination, and leaves a massive and costly legacy of decommissioning redundant nuclear power plants and managing and disposing of nuclear waste (NDA current estimates £260bn).  

“Events in Ukraine have also demonstrated that nuclear power plants represent a massive target and a potential ‘dirty bomb’ in the event of war with a hostile state actor and Britain’s nuclear reactors have historically been powered by uranium from Russia which is now an unreliable supplier as it is that hostile state actor.” 

The NFLAs are instead calling on an energy strategy that prioritises the reduction of energy usage in the UK. 

Continue reading →

July 7, 2024 Posted by | politics, UK | Leave a comment

Second review of ARC’s Small Modular Nuclear Reactor not complete, despite layoffs

That’s after ARC Clean Technology Canada said it downsized with that review now over

Telegraph Journal, Adam Huras, Jul 04, 2024 

A second design review of a New Brunswick-based company’s proposed small modular nuclear reactor is not yet complete, according to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

That’s after ARC Clean Technology Canada said it downsized with that review now over.

Brunswick News reported last month that ARC, one of two companies pursuing SMR technology in the province, had handed out layoff notices to some of its employees, citing its latest design phase coming to an end.

That’s as its CEO also departed.

But the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission says it’s “months” away from completing its review, and may need more information from the company.

“We have received all of ARC’s major submissions as part of the vendor design review process and our experts are carefully reviewing them,” commission spokesperson Braeson Holland told Brunswick News.

“It is possible that staff will have additional questions for the vendor. In that case, additional information may be requested, and the company will be expected to provide it for the vendor design review to proceed.

“Provided that any additional information requested is submitted in a timely manner and that the company remains in compliance with its service agreement with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, we anticipate that the review will be complete within several months.”

A vendor design review is an optional service that the commission provides for the assessment of a vendor’s reactor design.

The objective is to verify, at a high level, that Canadian nuclear regulatory requirements and expectations, as well as Canadian codes and standards, will be met.

The company did complete a Phase 1 review of its ARC-100 sodium-cooled fast reactor in October 2019.

An executive summary of that review, made public by the commission, noted that there were requests for additional information, as well as technical discussions through letters, emails, meetings and teleconferences, after an initial submission.

The result of that first review found that “additional work is required by ARC” to address findings raised in the review, specifically around the reactor’s management system.

It then lists a series of technical concerns, but concludes that “these issues are foreseen to be resolvable.”

A Phase 2 design review, which ARC is undergoing right now, goes into further detail, and focuses on identifying fundamental barriers to licensing for a new design in Canada, according to the commission.

That review started in February 2022, and was expected to be completed in January of this year.

It’s unclear why it has yet to be completed.

At a New Brunswick Energy and Utilities Board hearing last month into a recent power rate hike, NB Power vice president Brad Coady testified he doesn’t expect SMRs will be ready by an original target date of 2030.

The utility now believes they’ll be ready by 2032 or 2033……………….
https://tj.news/new-brunswick/second-review-of-arcs-smr-not-complete-despite-layoffs

July 7, 2024 Posted by | Canada, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors | Leave a comment

Constellation Energy plans restart of Three Mile Island nuclear plant

Constellation Energy is in discussions with the US state of Pennsylvania
governor’s office and state legislators regarding funding for a potential
restart of a unit at the Three Mile Island power facility, Reuters has
reported. The ongoing talks have been described as “beyond preliminary”
by two sources.

The move indicates that Constellation is moving forward
with plans to bring back part of the nuclear generation site in southern
Pennsylvania, which was operational from 1974 until its closure in 2019.
The unit at Three Mile Island that may be restarted is distinct from the
facility’s unit 2, which suffered a partial meltdown in 1979 – the most
notorious nuclear accident in US history.

 Power Technology 3rd July 2024 https://www.power-technology.com/news/constellation-three-mile-island-pennsylvania/

July 7, 2024 Posted by | business and costs, USA | Leave a comment

Trusting the ‘Five Eyes’ Only

For Their Eyes Only

The “Five Eyes” (FVEY) is an elite club of five English-speaking countries — Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States — that have agreed to cooperate in intelligence matters and share top-secret information. They all became parties to what was at first the bilateral UKUSA Agreement, a 1946 treaty for secret cooperation between the two countries in what’s called “signals intelligence” — data collected by electronic means, including by tapping phone lines or listening in on satellite communications. (The agreement was later amended to include the other three nations.) Almost all of the Five Eyes’ activities are conducted in secret, and its existence was not even disclosed until 2010. You might say that it constitutes the most secretive, powerful club of nations on the planet.

Anglo-Saxon solidarity supersedes all other relationships.

 JULY 5, 2024 By Michael Klare / TomDispatch,  https://scheerpost.com/2024/07/05/trusting-the-five-eyes-only/
Wherever he travels globally, President Biden has sought to project the United States as the rejuvenated leader of a broad coalition of democratic nations seeking to defend the “rules-based international order” against encroachments by hostile autocratic powers, especially China, Russia, and North Korea. “We established NATO, the greatest military alliance in the history of the world,” he told veterans of D-Day while at Normandy, France on June 6th. “Today… NATO is more united than ever and even more prepared to keep the peace, deter aggression, defend freedom all around the world.”

In other venues, Biden has repeatedly highlighted Washington’s efforts to incorporate the “Global South” — the developing nations of Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East — into just such a broad-based U.S.-led coalition. At the recent G7 summit of leading Western powers in southern Italy, for example, he backed measures supposedly designed to engage those countries “in a spirit of equitable and strategic partnership.”

But all of his soaring rhetoric on the subject scarcely conceals an inescapable reality: the United States is more isolated internationally than at any time since the Cold War ended in 1991. It has also increasingly come to rely on a tight-knit group of allies, all of whom are primarily English-speaking and are part of the Anglo-Saxon colonial diaspora. Rarely mentioned in the Western media, the Anglo-Saxonization of American foreign and military policy has become a distinctive — and provocative — feature of the Biden presidency.

America’s Growing Isolation

To get some appreciation for Washington’s isolation in international affairs, just consider the wider world’s reaction to the administration’s stance on the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Joe Biden sought to portray the conflict there as a heroic struggle between the forces of democracy and the brutal fist of autocracy. But while he was generally successful in rallying the NATO powers behind Kyiv — persuading them to provide arms and training to the beleaguered Ukrainian forces, while reducing their economic links with Russia — he largely failed to win over the Global South or enlist its support in boycotting Russian oil and natural gas.

Despite what should have been a foreboding lesson, Biden returned to the same universalist rhetoric in 2023 (and this year as well) to rally global support for Israel in its drive to extinguish Hamas after that group’s devastating October 7th rampage. But for most non-European leaders, his attempt to portray support for Israel as a noble response proved wholly untenable once that country launched its full-scale invasion of Gaza and the slaughter of Palestinian civilians commenced. For many of them, Biden’s words seemed like sheer hypocrisy given Israel’s history of violating U.N. resolutions concerning the legal rights of Palestinians in the West Bank and its indiscriminate destruction of homes, hospitals, mosques, schools, and aid centers in Gaza. In response to Washington’s continued support for Israel, many leaders of the Global South have voted against the United States on Gaza-related measures at the U.N. or, in the case of South Africa, have brought suit against Israel at the World Court for perceived violations of the 1948 Genocide Convention.


In the face of such adversity, the White House has worked tirelessly to bolster its existing alliances, while trying to establish new ones wherever possible. Pity poor Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who has made seemingly endless trips to Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East trying to drum up support for Washington’s positions — with consistently meager results.

Here, then, is the reality of this anything but all-American moment: as a global power, the United States possesses a diminishing number of close, reliable allies – most of which are members of NATO, or countries that rely on the United States for nuclear protection (Japan and South Korea), or are primarily English-speaking (Australia and New Zealand). And when you come right down to it, the only countries the U.S. really trusts are the “Five Eyes.”

For Their Eyes Only

The “Five Eyes” (FVEY) is an elite club of five English-speaking countries — Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States — that have agreed to cooperate in intelligence matters and share top-secret information. They all became parties to what was at first the bilateral UKUSA Agreement, a 1946 treaty for secret cooperation between the two countries in what’s called “signals intelligence” — data collected by electronic means, including by tapping phone lines or listening in on satellite communications. (The agreement was later amended to include the other three nations.) Almost all of the Five Eyes’ activities are conducted in secret, and its existence was not even disclosed until 2010. You might say that it constitutes the most secretive, powerful club of nations on the planet.

The origins of the Five Eyes can be traced back to World War II, when American and British codebreakers, including famed computer theorist Alan Turing, secretly convened at Bletchley Park, the British codebreaking establishment, to share intelligence gleaned from solving the German “Enigma” code and the Japanese “Purple” code. At first an informal arrangement, the secretive relationship was formalized in the British-US Communication Intelligence Agreement of 1943 and, after the war ended, in the UKUSA Agreement of 1946. That arrangement allowed for the exchange of signals intelligence between the National Security Agency (NSA) and its British equivalent, the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) — an arrangement that persists to this day and undergirds what has come to be known as the “special relationship” between the two countries.

Then, in 1955, at the height of the Cold War, that intelligence-sharing agreement was expanded to include those other three English-speaking countries, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. For secret information exchange, the classification “AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY” was then affixed to all the documents they shared, and from that came the “Five Eyes” label. France, Germany, Japan, and a few other countries have since sought entrance to that exclusive club, but without success.

Although largely a Cold War artifact, the Five Eyes intelligence network continued operating right into the era after the Soviet Union collapsed, spying on militant Islamic groups and government leaders in the Middle East, while eavesdropping on Chinese business, diplomatic, and military activities in Asia and elsewhere. According to former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, such efforts were conducted under specialized top-secret programs like Echelon, a system for collecting business and government data from satellite communications, and PRISM, an NSA program to collect data transmitted via the Internet.

As part of that Five Eyes endeavor, the U.S., the United Kingdom, and Australia jointly maintain a controversial, highly secret intelligence-gathering facility at Pine Gap, Australia, near the small city of Alice Springs. Known as the Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap (JDFPG), it’s largely run by the NSA, CIA, GCHQ, and the Australian Security Intelligence Organization. Its main purpose, according to Edward Snowden and other whistle-blowers, is to eavesdrop on radio, telephone, and internet communications in Asia and the Middle East and share that information with the intelligence and military arms of the Five Eyes. Since the Israeli invasion of Gaza was launched, it is also said to be gathering intelligence on Palestinian forces in Gaza and sharing that information with the Israeli Defense Forces. This, in turn, prompted a rare set of protests at the remote base when, in late 2023, dozens of pro-Palestinian activists sought to block the facility’s entry road.

Anglo-Saxon Solidarity in Asia

The Biden administration’s preference for relying on Anglophone countries in promoting its strategic objectives has been especially striking in the Asia-Pacific region. The White House has been clear that its primary goal in Asia is to construct a network of U.S.-friendly states committed to the containment of China’s rise. This was spelled out, for example, in the administration’s Indo-Pacific Strategy of the United States of 2022. Citing China’s muscle-flexing in Asia, it called for a common effort to resist that country’s “bullying of neighbors in the East and South China” and so protect the freedom of commerce. “A free and open Indo-Pacific can only be achieved if we build collective capacity for a new age,” the document stated. “We will pursue this through a latticework of strong and mutually reinforcing coalitions.”

That “latticework,” it indicated, would extend to all American allies and partners in the region, including Australia, Japan, New Zealand, the Philippines, and South Korea, as well as friendly European parties (especially Great Britain and France). Anyone willing to help contain China, the mantra seems to go, is welcome to join that U.S.-led coalition. But if you look closely, the renewed prominence of Anglo-Saxon solidarity becomes ever more evident.


Of all the military agreements signed by the Biden administration with America’s Pacific allies, none is considered more important in Washington than AUKUS, a strategic partnership agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Announced by the three member states on Sept. 15, 2021, it contains two “pillars,” or areas of cooperation — the first focused on submarine technology and the second on AI, autonomous weapons, as well as other advanced technologies. As in the FVEY arrangement, both pillars involve high-level exchanges of classified data, but also include a striking degree of military and technological cooperation. And note the obvious: there is no equivalent U.S. agreement with any non-English-speaking country in Asia.

Consider, for instance, the Pillar I submarine arrangement. As the deal now stands, Australia will gradually retire its fleet of six diesel-powered submarines and purchase three to five top-of-the-line U.S.-made Los Angeles-class nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs), while it works with the United Kingdom to develop a whole new class of subs, the SSN-AUKUS, to be powered by an American-designed nuclear propulsion system. But — get this — to join, the Australians first had to scrap a $90 billion submarine deal with a French defense firm, causing a severe breach in the Franco-Australian relationship and demonstrating, once again, that Anglo-Saxon solidarity supersedes all other relationships.

Now, with the French out of the picture, the U.S. and Australia are proceeding with plans to build those Los Angeles-class SSNs — a multibillion-dollar venture that will require Australian naval officers to study nuclear propulsion in the United States. When the subs are finally launched (possibly in the early 2030s), American submariners will sail with the Australians to help them gain experience with such systems. Meanwhile, American military contractors will be working with Australia and the UK designing and constructing a next-generation sub, the SSN-AUKUS, that’s supposed to be ready in the 2040s. The three AUKUS partners will also establish a joint submarine base near Perth in Western Australia.

Pillar II of AUKUS has received far less media attention but is no less important. It calls for American, British, Australian scientific and technical cooperation in advanced technologies, including AI, robotics, and hypersonics, aimed at enhancing the future military capabilities of all three, including through the development of robot submarines that could be used to spy on or attack Chinese ships and subs.

Aside from the extraordinary degree of cooperation on sensitive military technologies — far greater than the U.S. has with any other countries — the three-way partnership also represents a significant threat to China. The substitution of nuclear-powered subs for diesel-powered ones in Australia’s fleet and the establishment of a joint submarine base at Perth will enable the three AUKUS partners to conduct significantly longer undersea patrols in the Pacific and, were a war to break out, attack Chinese ships, ports, and submarines across the region. I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that the Chinese have repeatedly denounced the arrangement, which represents a potentially mortal threat to them.

Unintended Consequences

It’s hardly a surprise that the Biden administration, facing growing hostility and isolation in the global arena, has chosen to bolster its ties further with other Anglophone countries rather than make the policy changes needed to improve relations with the rest of the world. The administration knows exactly what it would have to do to begin to achieve that objective: discontinue arms deliveries to Israel until the fighting stops in Gaza; help reduce the burdensome debt load of so many developing nations; and promote food, water security, and other life-enhancing measures in the Global South. Yet, despite promises to take just such steps, President Biden and his top foreign policy officials have focused on other priorities — the encirclement of China above all else — while the inclination to lean on Anglo-Saxon solidarity has only grown.

However, by reserving Washington’s warmest embraces for its anglophone allies, the administration has actually been creating fresh threats to U.S. security. Many countries in contested zones on the emerging geopolitical chessboard, especially in Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, were once under British colonial rule and so anything resembling a potential Washington-London neocolonial restoration is bound to prove infuriating to them. Add to that the inevitable propaganda from China, Iran, and Russia about a developing Anglo-Saxon imperial nexus and you have an obvious recipe for widespread global discontent.

It’s undoubtedly convenient to use the same language when sharing secrets with your closest allies, but that should hardly be the deciding factor in shaping this nation’s foreign policy. If the United States is to prosper in an increasingly diverse, multicultural world, it will have learn to think and act in a far more multicultural fashion — and that should include eliminating any vestiges of an exclusive Anglo-Saxon global power alliance.

July 6, 2024 Posted by | politics international, USA | 1 Comment

Trump Advisers Call for U.S. Nuclear Weapons Testing if He Is Elected

A former national security adviser says Washington “must test new nuclear weapons for reliability and safety in the real world,” while critics say the move could incite a global arms race that heightens the risk of war.

New York Times, By William J. Broad, 5 July 24

Allies of Donald J. Trump are proposing that the United States restart the testing of nuclear weapons in underground detonations should the former president be re-elected in November. A number of nuclear experts reject such a resumption as unnecessary and say it would threaten to end a testing moratorium that the world’s major atomic powers have honored for decades.

In the latest issue of Foreign Affairs magazine, Robert C. O’Brien, a former national security adviser to Mr. Trump, urges him to conduct nuclear tests if he wins a new term. Washington, he wrote, “must test new nuclear weapons for reliability and safety in the real world for the first time since 1992.” Doing so, he added, would help the United States “maintain technical and numerical superiority to the combined Chinese and Russian nuclear stockpiles.”

At the Cold War’s end, in 1992, the United States gave up the explosive testing of nuclear arms and eventually talked other atomic powers into doing likewise.  The United States instead turned to experts and machines at the nation’s weapons labs to verify the lethality of the country’s arsenal. Today the machines include room-size supercomputers, the world’s most powerful X-ray machine and a system of lasers the size of a sports stadium.

In his article, Mr. O’Brien described such work as just “using computer models.” Republican members of Congress and some nuclear experts have faulted the nonexplosive testing as insufficient to assure the U.S. military establishment that its arsenal works, and have called for live tests.

But the Biden administration and other Democrats warn that a U.S. test could lead to a chain reaction of testing by other countries. Over time, they add, resumption could result in a nuclear arms race that destabilizes the global balance of terror and heightens the risk of war.

“It’s a terrible idea,” said Ernest J. Moniz, who oversaw the U.S. nuclear arsenal as the secretary of energy in the Obama administration. “New testing would make us less secure. You can’t divorce it from the global repercussions.”

Siegfried S. Hecker, a former director of the Los Alamos weapons lab in New Mexico where J. Robert Oppenheimer led the creation of the atomic bomb, called new testing a risky trade-off between domestic gains and global losses. “We stand to lose more” than America’s nuclear rivals would, he said.

It’s unclear if Mr. Trump would act on the testing proposals. In a statement, Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles, Mr. Trump’s co-campaign managers, did not directly address the candidate’s position on nuclear testing. They said that Mr. O’Brien as well as other outside groups and individuals were “misguided, speaking prematurely, and may well be entirely wrong” about a second Trump administration’s plans.

Even so, Mr. Trump’s history of atomic bluster, threats and hard-line policies suggests that he may be open to such guidance from his security advisers. In 2018, he boasted that his “Nuclear Button” was “much bigger & more powerful” than the force controller of Kim Jong Un, the North Korean leader.

A U.S. detonation would violate the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, long considered one of the most successful arms control measures. Signed by the world’s atomic powers in 1996, it sought to curb a costly arms race that had spun out of control……………………………………………………………… more https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/05/science/nuclear-testing-trump.html

July 6, 2024 Posted by | politics, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Tensions with Iran spotlight Israel’s hidden nuclear arsenal

Business Insider, Paul Iddon , Jul 4, 2024

  • Israel is one of the world’s few countries armed with nukes and multiple means to deliver them.
  • An Israeli aerospace official recently broached these “doomsday weapons.”
  • “Israel’s triad remains remarkably powerful for a country its size,” an aviation expert said.

The prospect of a full-scale war between Israel and the powerful Hezbollah militia in Lebanon has sent tensions spiking and briefly highlighted the power of Israel’s undeclared nuclear weapons.

Israel is one of the world’s few countries armed with nukes and multiple means to deliver them, a capability recently referenced by an Israeli official with a leading government-run aerospace manufacturer.

“If we understand that there is an existential danger here, and that Iran, Yemen, Syria, Iraq and all the countries of the Middle East decide that it is time to settle against us, I understand that we have the capabilities to use doomsday weapons,” Yair Katz, chairman of the Israel Aerospace Industries Workers’ Council, reportedly said on Saturday.

He was speaking a day after Iran’s United Nations mission warned that “an obliterating war will ensue” if Israel commits “full-scale military aggression” against the Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon. It also declared that in this scenario, “all options” are on the table, including “the full involvement of all resistance fronts,” a clear reference to Iran’s militia proxies in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen, the other countries Katz specifically mentioned.

By invoking doomsday weapons, it was clear Katz was alluding to Israel’s nuclear weapons arsenal — an arsenal over which neither he nor IAI have any command-and-control. But his use of the word “capabilities” is a reminder that Israel has ground, air, and sea-based delivery systems for its nuclear weapons. In other words, a complete nuclear triad……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

“The true second strike threat for Israel is the United States itself, which in a theoretical nuclear war scenario would almost certainly retaliate on Israel’s behalf should it ever suffer a first strike from a nuclear rival,” Bohl said. “This makes it so that a second strike capability is important in terms of deterrence for full-scale escalation from a power like Iran.”

“But from a strictly tactical perspective, it would be the United States that truly serves as Israel’s most effective second strike system.”  https://www.businessinsider.com/iran-hezbollah-israel-hidden-nuclear-weapons-arsenal-2024-7

July 6, 2024 Posted by | Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

NATO Members Agree To Give Ukraine $43 Billion in Military Aid for 2025

The pledge will be made at next week’s NATO summit, where Ukraine is also expected to be told it’s too corrupt to join the alliance

by Dave DeCamp July 4, 2024 ,  https://news.antiwar.com/2024/07/04/nato-members-agree-to-give-ukraine-43-billion-in-military-aid-for-2025/
NATO allies have agreed to pledge $43 billion in military aid for Ukraine, which will be provided next year, Reuters reported on Wednesday.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg was looking for the alliance to make a multi-year commitment to ensure long-term support for the proxy war, but the allies did not agree. Instead, they will re-evaluate military aid for Ukraine each year.

The agreement says that NATO allies will “aim to meet this pledge through proportionate contributions.” If the $43 billion is funded based on how much each member contributes to NATO, most of the burden would be on the US since it pays for about two-thirds of the alliance’s budget.

The $43 billion is part of a slew of measures NATO will announce at its summit next week in Washington. NATO is also expected to station a civilian official in Kyiv and establish a new command in Germany that will oversee military aid and training for Ukraine, taking over duties currently overseen by the US.

While planning to provide tens of billions in new military aid, NATO will also tell Ukraine that it’s too corrupt to join the alliance. The Telegraph reported this week that the alliance will release a communique calling on Ukraine to take more anti-corruption steps before talks on its NATO membership could progress.

President Biden has frequently cited Ukraine’s corruption as a reason why the country couldn’t join NATO. But that hasn’t stopped him from providing over $100 billion in aid to Ukraine, which includes tens of billions in the form of direct budgetary aid that funds the government.

July 6, 2024 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Former New Brunswick energy minister joins nuclear industry after resigning in June

Mike Holland will be joining AtkinsRéalis, formerly SNC-Lavalin

CBC News · Jul 05, 2024

A former New Brunswick cabinet minister who resigned in June is joining AtkinsRéalis, a Montreal-based company previously known as SNC-Lavalin Group. 

Mike Holland, who was natural resources and energy development minister and MLA for the riding of Albert, announced at the end of June that he was quitting to pursue a job in the private sector. 

Holland will be joining the AtkinsRéalis team as the director of business development for North America.

The company told Radio-Canada the reason it recruited the former minister was to help increase sales of its nuclear reactor models and invest in the development of small modular reactors. 

In a statement, the company said it’s “working to accelerate” sales of its Candu reactors in Canada and internationally.

…………………….When Holland announced his resignation from the New Brunswick government, he said the company he accepted an offer from is not a company he dealt with in his role as a minister, nor as an MLA.

However, AtkinsRéalis, then known as SNC-Lavalin, announced a partnership with Moltex Energy Canada in 2022 and Holland was quoted in the news release at the time.

“This agreement contributes not only to the growth of long-term, high-quality jobs in New Brunswick’s energy sector, it also recognizes the leadership role of both Moltex and the province in advancing the next generation of nuclear technology,” he said in the 2022 release.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/energy-minister-nuclear-resignation-1.7255601

July 6, 2024 Posted by | Canada, secrets,lies and civil liberties | Leave a comment

Nuclear power would put our energy security into Russian hands.

 George Baxter: Developing nuclear power would put our energy security into
Russian hands. Whenever there’s debate on energy and climate change, as
we are seeing fleetingly in the 2024 election campaign, you can rely on
nuclear power fans to flood the zone with claims that it is the answer.

It all seems so simple. But it isn’t. Far from it.

Take uranium. It’s not talked about much, but nuclear’s raw material is a global commodity – and we don’t have any. The global market is dominated by Russia which
controls around 50% of the supply of raw ore. Mining uranium isn’t the only
issue. Despite sanctions over the war in Ukraine, Russia continues to
supply western nuclear power plants with enriched uranium fuel. According
to the Royal United Services Institute, Europe and the US have scrambled to
build alternative supply chains for enriched fuel to reduce dependencies on
Russia. It is an intensifying international resource power play.

Replacing our vulnerability to international energy shocks and the market volatility
of fossil gas, with long term dependencies on uranium ore and nuclear fuel
hardly seems the wisest path to take, especially when your land and seas
are awash with untapped renewable energy.

A baseload of constant power
output from nuclear is not needed to make the electricity system work. Over
ten years ago the CEO of National Grid said the concept of baseload was
“already outdated.” while casting doubt on the role of large nuclear on
a modern green electricity network.

Nuclear creates more problems than it
solves because it isn’t very flexible. So when it is really windy or
sunny, it’s renewables that get turned off.

And worse, if there is a problem (and there have been issues in Scotland including cracks in the reactor cores of both Hunterston and Torness) the shut down can last for
weeks or months, and other reactors of the same design risk shut down as a
precaution.

If a wind turbine is attacked or damaged, there’s little drama,
we just put another one up. The reactors at Fukishima are not back in
operation – 13 years on – lest we forget. Renewables are variable in
nature, and predictably so, well in advance. To manage variability of some
renewable sources like the wind and sun, more flexible non-nuclear
technologies are a much better fit by far.

 Herald 2nd July 2024

https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/viewpoint/24422691.nuclear-power-put-energy-security-russian-hands/

July 5, 2024 Posted by | spinbuster, UK | Leave a comment

Landmark Swedish Court Judgment against Nuclear Waste Repository.

Landmark Swedish Court Judgment against Nuclear Waste Repository: Read the English Translation  http://www.dianuke.org/landmark-swedish-court-judgment-nuclear-waste-repository-read-english-translation/

MKG, the Swedish NGO Office for Nuclear Waste Review has made an unofficial translation into English of the Swedish Environmental Court opinion on the power industry’s Nuclear Waste Company SKB’s license application for a final repository for spent nuclear fuel in Forsmark, Sweden.

The court said no to the application because it considered that there were problems with the copper canister that had to be resolved now and not later. The translation shows the courts judicial argumentation and why it decided not to accept the regulator SSM’s opinion that the problems with the integrity of the copper canister were not serious and could likely be solved at a later stage in the decision-making process.

The main difference between the court’s and the regulator’s decision-making was that the court decided to rely on a multitude of scientific sources and information and not only on the material provided by SKB. It had also been uncovered that the main corrosion expert at SSM did not want to say yes to the application at this time that may have influenced the court’s decision-making. In fact there appear to have been many dissenting voices in the regulator despite the regulator’s claim in the court that a united SSM stood behind its opinion.

The court underlines in its opinion that the Environmental Code requires that the repository should be shown to be safe at this stage in the decision-making process, i.e. before the government has its say. The court says that some uncertainties will always remain but it sees the possible copper canister problems as so serious that it is not clear that the regulator’s limits for release of radioactivity can be met. This is a reason to say no to the project unless it can be shown that the copper canister will work as intended. The copper canister has to provide isolation from the radioactivity in the spent nuclear fuel to humans and the environment for very long time-scales.

It is still unclear how the process will proceed. The community of Östhammar has cancelled the referendum on the repository, as there will be no question from the government in the near future. The government has set up a working group of civil servants to manage the government’s handling of the opinions delivered by the court and SSM. SSM has told the government that it is ok to say yes to the license application.

The court has stated that there are copper canister issues that need to be considered further. The nuclear waste company SKB has said that it is preparing documentation for the government to show that there are no problems with the canister. Whether the government thinks that this will be enough remains to be seen. This is likely not what the court had in mind. The government would be wise to make a much broader review of the issue. There is a need for a thorough judicial review on the governmental level in order to override the court’s opinion. Otherwise the government’ decision may not survive an appeal to the Supreme Administrative Court.

There are eminent corrosion experts that are of the opinion that copper is a bad choice as a canister material. There is also increasing experimental evidence that this is the case. One problem for the court was likely that SKB has hesitant to do the required corrosion studies that show that copper does not corrode in an anoxic repository environment. The 18-year FEBEX field test shows that copper corrodes relatively rapidly with pitting corrosion. SKB says that all corrosion is due to in-leaking oxygen but it is now clear that experimental systems containing copper and clay become anoxic within weeks or months so this explanation is not valid. 

MKG has for long wanted SKB to retrieve the next experimental package in the LOT field test in the Äspö Hard Rock Laboratory. SKB had refused. The remaining packages have now been heated for 18 years. When a 5-year package was retrieved in 2006 it was discovered that there was “unexpectedly high corrosion”. There is clearly a need for more lab and field test results to decide whether copper is a good and safe choice for a canister material.

The court’s decision-making shows the importance of a democratic and open governance in environmental decision-making. It is important that the continued decision-making regarding the Swedish repository for spent nuclear is transparent and multi-faceted.

July 5, 2024 Posted by | environment, Reference, Sweden, wastes | Leave a comment

Ukrainian drones injure Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant workers, say Russian-backed officials

By Reuters, July 4, 2024,  https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukrainian-drones-injure-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-power-plant-workers-say-russian-2024-07-03/—

MOSCOW, July 3 (Reuters) – A Ukrainian drone attack injured eight workers from the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and left a nearby town largely without power and water, Russian-backed officials said on Wednesday.

In a statement on Telegram, the plant’s management said that eight staff had been injured during an attack by three Ukrainian kamikaze drones on an electricity substation near the plant in south-eastern Ukraine.

It said all of the injured workers were receiving medical treatment.

Reuters was not able to independently confirm what had happened and there was no immediate comment from Ukraine.

Eduard Senovoz, the Russian-installed mayor of the nearby city of Enerhodar where the plant’s workers live, said in a statement that the attack had left most of the city without power and water.

The attack was the third of its kind within two weeks, he said, adding that work was underway to repair the damage to the substation.

Alexei Likhachev, director general of Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, said the attack was the first time that the power plant’s workers had been deliberately put in danger.

In comments to Russian state TV channels, Likhachev called on the Vienna-based U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), to assess what had happened.

“IAEA head Rafael Grossi has repeatedly said that the activities of nuclear cities, the lives of people, and especially the lives of nuclear power plant workers are ‘sacred’ elements of nuclear safety. Today they have been defiantly violated,” Likhachev said.

The IAEA last month called for a halt to attacks on Enerhodar after earlier attacks on electricity substations in the area.

July 5, 2024 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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