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US created Ukraine mess, now it must repair Russia relationship

But the US and NATO’s interest in Ukraine is not really about resolving its regional differences, but about something else altogether. The US coup was calculated to put Russia in an impossible position. If Russia did nothing, post-coup Ukraine would sooner or later join NATO, as NATO members already agreed to in principle in 2008. NATO forces would advance right up to Russia’s border and Russia’s important naval base at Sevastopol in the Crimea would fall under NATO control.

Underlying all these tensions is NATO’s expansion through Eastern Europe to the borders of Russia, in violation of commitments Western officials made at the end of the Cold War. The US and NATO’s refusal to acknowledge that they have violated those commitments or to negotiate a diplomatic resolution with the Russians is a central factor in the breakdown of US-Russian relations.

US created Ukraine mess, now it must repair Russia relationship  https://johnmenadue.com/us-created-ukraine-mess-now-it-must-repair-russia-relationship/ By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J.S. DaviesFeb 5, 2022  Western media accounts of the current Ukraine crisis are forgetting the US’s role in the 2014 coup, which forced the then-president to flee.

By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J.S. DaviesFeb 5, 2022  Western media accounts of the current Ukraine crisis are forgetting the US’s role in the 2014 coup, which forced the then-president to flee.

Feb 5, 2022  Western media accounts of the current Ukraine crisis are forgetting the US’s role in the 2014 coup, which forced the then-president to flee. So what are Americans to believe about the rising tensions over Ukraine? The United States and Russia both claim their escalations are defensive, responding to threats and escalations by the other side, but the resulting spiral of escalation can only make war more likely. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is warning that “panic” by US and Western leaders is already causing economic destabilisation in Ukraine.

By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J.S. DaviesFeb 5, 2022  Western media accounts of the current Ukraine crisis are forgetting the US’s role in the 2014 coup, which forced the then-president to flee.

US allies do not all support the current US policy. Germany is wisely refusing to funnel more weapons into Ukraine, in keeping with its long-standing policy of not sending weapons into conflict zones. Ralf Stegner, a senior Member of Parliament for Germany’s ruling Social Democrats, told the BBC on January 25 that the Minsk-Normandy process agreed to by France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine in 2015 is still the right framework for ending the civil war.

“The Minsk Agreement hasn’t been applied by both sides,” Stegner explained, “and it just doesn’t make any sense to think that forcing up the military possibilities would make it better. Rather, I think it’s the hour of diplomacy.”

By contrast, most American politicians and corporate media have fallen in line with a one-sided narrative that paints Russia as the aggressor in Ukraine, and they support sending more and more weapons to Ukrainian government forces. After decades of US military disasters based on such one-sided narratives, Americans should know better by now. But what is it that our leaders and the corporate media are not telling us this time?

The most critical events that have been airbrushed out of the West’s political narrative are the violation of agreements Western leaders made at the end of the Cold War not to expand NATO into Eastern Europe, and the US-backed coup in Ukraine in February 2014.

Continue reading →

February 7, 2022 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

France is exploring new ways to dispose of radioactive materials but public opposition is as fierce as ever

“There may be a price [communities] are willing to accept in order to stomach the waste and its risks, but we don’t know what that price is yet,” … “If it’s high enough, it will ultimately add to the cost of disposal.”  Local authorities have poured millions of euros of subsidies and compensation into the area to support the project

The nuclear power dilemma: where to put the lethal waste
France is exploring new ways to dispose of radioactive materials but public opposition is as fierce as ever, Ft.com Anna Gross in Chooz and Sarah White in Bure 6 FEB 22, 

”………………….Resistance is fissile  Cigeo has attracted the same kind of vocal opposition found at other potential burial sites. And, as a result Bure, a village of fewer than 100 inhabitants, has become a battleground where protesters have regularly clashed with police over the future of the site. Demonstrators have set up a “house of resistance” in Bure that has become a magnet for anti-nuclear protesters around the country. The former barn is equipped with a projection room, mattresses to welcome guests and a cosy communal kitchen.

Campaigners say the Bure site has become representative of a broader cause. “Beyond the waste, it’s nuclear production above all else that worries us,” says a 29-year-old jurist who gave his name as Antoine, one of a handful of campaigners manning the fort on a snowy February morning. “It’s a supposedly low carbon source of energy, but you’ve got to build the reactors . . . it is such a dangerous and destructive solution.” Yet the state holds that the undeniable risks of nuclear energy are outweighed by its potential benefits as a cost-effective way of cutting CO2 emissions. According to a report last year from French grid operator RTE, France’s cheapest way to reach carbon neutrality by 2050 would involve building 14 new reactors. Under the scenarios RTE presented, if France built no new nuclear reactors and relied exclusively on expanding renewables and extending the lifespan of existing nuclear, this would cost €10bn more per year than other options including new reactors, with the cost of decommissioning factored into the final bill.

But that may not factor in the costs of convincing French citizens to host such facilities in their backyards. Bure resident Anne-Marie Henn, a retiree, says the project has forced her and her artist husband Jacques to give up on their dream of creating a painting atelier in an annex to their home. “We’d like to leave, but our house isn’t worth anything any more,” she says. Ed Lyman, senior global security scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, who has spent decades researching nuclear power safety, says the science behind burying waste is robust, and the dangers of corrosion or leakage minimal. But there remain real risks for the public, he says, such as accidents happening when materials are transported to the site.

“There may be a price [communities] are willing to accept in order to stomach the waste and its risks, but we don’t know what that price is yet,” he adds. “If it’s high enough, it will ultimately add to the cost of disposal.”  Local authorities have poured millions of euros of subsidies and compensation into the area to support the project and residents. In Bure, that has translated into snazzy lampposts lining every street alongside the barns and stone houses; households have also got fibre optic internet connections and sanitation networks have been improved. “We’ve got to deal with this crap,” Henn says. “At the very least we can benefit a bit from [subsidies].”

But the concerns of many communities go way beyond immediate dangers to more existential questions: how can we ensure that not just our children and grandchildren, but people living thousands of years in the future have the knowledge and understanding to handle it responsibly? And how can we be sure that the storage containers we have developed now will stand the test of time? “What we’ll be getting here is the really dangerous core of the waste,” Henn says, adding that it was “the generations to come” that worried her.

Andra, the French state agency responsible for nuclear waste management, is considering ways to warn future generations of what lies below Bure — perhaps by inscribing microscopic information on a hard disk of sapphire, designed to withstand erosion, should the site be forgotten. “Even if we lose our collective memory, the storage site will be safe,” says spokesperson Audrey Guillemenet. If these kinds of innovations fail to impress French lawmakers and the site does not win approval, that leaves the government with a problem that goes far beyond the billions spent on construction. “Some 50 per cent of the [nuclear] waste destined to come here eventually already exists,” says Guillemenet. Forget the next generation of power plants; the decades-old materials Gannaz and his predecessors have removed from Chooz A are a problem that needs a solution. If it is not Bure, then what is it?  https://www.ft.com/content/246dad82-c107-4886-9be2-e3b3c4c4f315?segmentid=acee4131-99c2-09d3-a635-873e61754ec6

February 7, 2022 Posted by | France, opposition to nuclear, wastes | Leave a comment

Can Space Tourism Co-exist with Space being turned into a War Zone?

Can Space Tourism Co-exist with Space being turned into a War Zone?, By Karl Grossman, Space 4 Peace, Presented at the Space Tourism: Legal Dimensions Conference, 29 January 2022

The push to turn space into a war zone could spell goodbye to space tourism. The space tourism drive that is underway, led by billionaires Jeff Bezos with his Blue Origin company, Richard Branson and his Virgin Galactic, and Elon Musk and his SpaceX operation, is seen as only a start. As Dylan Taylor wrote in 2021 on www.space.com in an article headed “The Future of space tourism,” it’s a “a growing market expected to be worth at least $3 billion by 2030.” Space.com identified Taylor as an “entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist” and “cofounding patron of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation.” https://www.space.com/future-of-space-tourism-op-ed……………………………

Meanwhile, there’s the push, led by the United States, to turn space into a war zone—and this, despite the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 that sets space aside for peaceful purposes.

As then U.S. President Donald Trump declared in 2018 as he advocated for formation of a U.S. Space Force, “it is not enough to merely have an American presence in space. We must have American dominance in space.”  https://www.space.com/40921-trump-space-traffic-policy-american-leadership.html

The following year, he signed the National Defense Authorization Act of 2020 establishing the Space Force as the sixth branch of U.S. armed forces and said: “Space is the world’s newest warfighting domain.” The Space Force, Trump said, would “help” the U.S. “control the ultimate high ground.” https://www.space.com/trump-creates-space-force-2020-defense-bill.html

Then, at the unveiling of a Space Force flag at the White House, Trump said: “Space is going to be…the future, both in terms of defense and offense.” https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-unveils-space-force-flag-ceremony-says-space-future-n1208021

Trump’s successor, U.S. President Joe Biden, has not rolled back the U.S. Space Force………………….

As to the impacts of war in space, Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, in an interview in 2021 related the projection of the late Edgar Mitchell, in 1971 the sixth U.S. astronaut to walk on the moon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow8c7LbPvuI&feature=youtu.be

Gagnon said:

In 1989 during one of our campaigns against NASA plutonium launches [NASA’s launching of plutonium-powered space probes], we had a rally at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and our keynote speaker that day was Apollo astronaut Edgar Mitchell, one of the moonwalkers. And he came and said if there is one war in space, it’ll be the one and the only. He said because we will create so much space debris or space junk from all the destroyed satellites and things like that in space that there would literally be a minefield encircling the planet – he called it a piranha-laced river—and we would not be able to get through. A rocket would not be able to get off this Earth through that minefield. So, it’s insane to think about having a war in space.

Gagnon has also spoken of how space warfare would “mean activity on Earth below would immediately shut down—cell phones, ATM machines, cable TV, traffic lights, weather prediction and more—all hooked up to satellites, would be lost. Modern society would go dark.” https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/12/18/the-very-bad-space-force-deal/

Also pointing to the generation of space debris resulting from warfare in space was Alexander Chanock in section titled “Problems With Weaponizing Space” in an article published in 2013 in Journal of Air Law and Commerce titled “The Problems and Potential Solutions Related to the Emergence of Space Weapons in the 2lst Century.” https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1327&context=jalc

Chanock, then a candidate for a law degree, now a legislative counsel in the U.S. House of Representatives, wrote that a major problem “is the amount of space debris that space weapons would produce….The fear is that destroying in space could generate extremely dangerous debris with a long orbital life.”

Chanock quoted Dr. Joel Primack, professor of physics and astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and “one of the premier experts on space debris, noted Chanock, as saying “the weaponization of space would make the debris problem much worse, and even one war in space could encase the entire planet in a shell of whizzing debris that would thereafter make space near the Earth highly hazardous for peaceful as well as military purposes.”……………………

U.S. interest in war in space has deep roots: back to the former Nazi rocket scientists and engineers brought to the U.S. from Germany after World War II under the U.S.’s Operation Paperclip. They ended up at the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama—to use “their technological expertise to help create the U.S. space and weapons program,” wrote Jack Manno, a professor of environmental studies at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science & Forestry, in his 1984 book Arming the Heavens: The Hidden Military Agenda for Space, 1945-1995. https://www.abebooks.com/9780396082118/Arming-heavens-hidden-military-agenda-0396082114/plp

“Many of the early space war schemes were dreamt up by scientists working for the German military, scientists who brought their rockets and their ideas to America after the war,” he wrote. Many of these scientists and engineers “later rose to positions of power in the U.S. military, NASA, and the aerospace industry.” Among them were “Wernher von Braun and his V-2 colleagues” who began “working on rockets for the U.S. Army,” and at the Army’s Redstone Arsenal “were given the task of producing an intermediate range ballistic range missile to carry battlefield atomic weapons up to 200 miles. The Germans produced a modified V-2 renamed the Redstone….Huntsville became a major center of U.S. space military activities.”

Manno told the story of former German Major General Walter Dornberger, who had been in charge of the entire Nazi rocket program, and how he “in 1947 as a consultant to the U.S Air Force and adviser to the Department of Defense…wrote a planning paper for his new employers. He proposed a system of hundreds of nuclear-armed satellites all orbiting at different altitudes and angles, each capable or reentering the atmosphere on command from Earth to proceed to its target. The Air Force began early work on Dornberger’s idea under the acronym NABS (Nuclear Armed Bombardment Satellites).”……………………………………..

This is pessimistic forecast need not be. The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 was—and is—a visionary documentary. “Let Us Beat Our Swords Into Plowshares” is the title of a statue by Evgeniy Vutetich in the sculpture garden of the UN in New York. It is based on the Book of Isaiah and its call that nations “shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

War on Earth is terrible enough. It must not be brought up to the heavens.

This will take continued take political will and international pressure—to preserve and extend the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and its setting aside space for peaceful purposes. Especially in the United States, this will require action at the grassroots because the two major political parties in the U.S. have joined in a bellicose stance on space, supporting it becoming a war zone. Every year, the grassroots organization Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, founded in Washington, D.C. in 1991 and the leading group internationally challenging the weaponization of space, holds a “Keep Space For Peace Week” with actions around the world. Meanwhile, there are nations around the globe that have, unlike the U.S., adopted a peaceful stance—as reflected in their support for the proposed PAROS treaty.

We must, indeed, keep space for peace.

Can space tourism co-exist with space being turned into a war zone? The answer is no.

And with a shooting war in space, it will not only space tourism that would be kissed goodbye. http://space4peace.org/can-space-tourism-co-exist-with-space-being-turned-into-a-war-zone/

February 7, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, technology, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Claims Over Broken Promises About NATO Simmer at the Heart of the Ukraine Crisis


Claims Over Broken Promises About NATO Simmer at the Heart of the Ukraine Crisis,  https://truthout.org/articles/claims-over-broken-promises-about-nato-simmer-at-the-heart-of-the-ukraine-crisis/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=c66419ef-902d-4088-8be5-ed3ee17ca2bf BYDavid N. Gibbs, Truthout February 6, 2022 In the continuing conflict between the United States and Russia, the central issue has always been the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) from its original boundaries in Central Europe during the Cold War. Recent efforts to incorporate Ukraine into NATO have greatly aggravated Russian suspicions, contributing to Russia’s rationale for their massing of troops on Ukrainian borders.

It is true that Russian President Vladimir Putin is a repressive leader with a poor human rights record, but that is no reason for the U.S. to risk undertaking a war. On the issue of NATO expansion, Putin has a legitimate complaint. If Ukraine were to join NATO, it would establish a U.S. ally on Russia’s southern border with the potential of U.S. military bases being aimed against Russia. We must consider this counterfactual: How would the U.S. respond if Russia were planning a military alliance with Mexico or Canada? There is no way of getting around the fact that NATO’s expansion has been profoundly destabilizing.

It is important to consider the historical context of Russian grievance: It is a matter of record that in 1990, the U.S. Secretary of State James Baker promised Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev that it would not expand NATO into the formerly communist states of Eastern Europe. In exchange, Gorbachev agreed not to oppose the upcoming reunification of Germany. Gorbachev fulfilled his part of the deal — Germany was reunified without Soviet objection — but then the U.S. promptly began laying plans to expand NATO. By 1999, the former communist states of Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic all joined NATO, disregarding the promises made to Gorbachev. Then, NATO continued expanding into most of Eastern Europe, as well as three former Soviet states, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. Russian officials have repeatedly objected to what they describe as U.S.’s bad faith regarding its past promises not to expand NATO………………………..

The real reason for preserving NATO — and ultimately expanding it — was to promote U.S. prestige and power, and also to benefit vested interests associated with what President Dwight D. Eisenhower once termed the military-industrial complex. In 1993, retired U.S. Admiral Eugene Carroll spoke with remarkable frankness about NATO’s real purpose:

Let me tell you one of the reasons you keep hearing so many contrived arguments for continuing the NATO alliance. It has been very, very good for the militaries of the countries involved…. If NATO goes away, all those jobs go away; all those lovely chateaus, and chauffeurs and railroad cars go away. It’s something that has been very enjoyable for a good many years, and the fact that there is no longer any requirement for it doesn’t mean they don’t want to keep a good thing going.

NATO’s expansion benefited the U.S. military, U.S. weapons manufacturers, and their counterparts in Western Europe. Eastern European states were eager to join what many viewed as a “prestigious” organization as a symbol that they had finally arrived on the world stage.

None of this had anything to do with security in any meaningful sense, since Russia was, for the most part, acting in accord with U.S. and Western interests. …………………

U.S. officials cannot go back in time to correct past mistakes; in all probability, they will never regain Russia’s trust. However, we do have an opportunity to deescalate tensions. The key Russian demand is a firm U.S. guarantee that Ukraine will not be allowed to join NATO. U.S. officials should be open to this demand, as a basis for a full settlement, and should forgo their obsession with relentlessly projecting U.S. power through NATO. Surely this outcome would be better than a new Cold War with a nuclear-armed Russia, which is becoming a serious risk. https://truthout.org/articles/claims-over-broken-promises-about-nato-simmer-at-the-heart-of-the-ukraine-crisis/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=c66419ef-902d-4088-8be5-ed3ee17ca2bf

February 7, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, politics international | Leave a comment

Lake animals near Chernobyl have mutations

Lake animals near Chernobyl have mutations  https://beyondnuclear.org/lake-animals-near-chernobyl-have-mutations/ February 4, 2022

Animals in lakes close to the Chernobyl nuclear reactor have more genetic mutations than those from further away – giving new insight into the effect of radiation on wild species, researchers at the University of Stirling have found,  writes Brendan Montague in The Ecologist.

DNA analysis of freshwater crustaceans, called Daphnia (pictured on original), revealed greater genetic diversity in lake populations that experienced the highest radiation dose rates following the accident in 1986.

Radiation is the primary cause of these genetic mutations, according to Dr Stuart Auld, who led the research.

Dr Auld, of Stirling’s faculty of natural sciences, said: “Chernobyl is a natural experiment in evolution, because the rate of genetic mutation is higher, and all evolutionary change is fuelled by mutations.

“Normally you have to wait for generations to see the effect of the environment on mutations, and most mutant animals are pretty damaged so don’t live long.

“By sequencing non-coding DNA – bits of genetic code that don’t actually affect the form or function of the organism – we were able to uncover these mutations.”

Dr Jessica Goodman collected the crustaceans using a kayak and net from lakes at varying distances from Chernobyl as part of her PhD. She flew the samples back to the lab at Stirling, where Dr Auld’s team isolated and analysed the DNA.

The research was assisted by June Brand at the University of Stirling and Gennady Laptev from the Ukrainian Hydrometeorological Institute in Kiev. It was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council.

The paper Radiation-mediated supply of genetic variation outweighs the effects of selection and drift in Chernobyl Daphnia populations is published in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology.

February 7, 2022 Posted by | environment, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Indigenous support for Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium

“Fix your damn mistakes before you ask us to risk anymore,” Pino said
recently during an interview from his home in Albuquerque. “The money
that we get from the nuclear industry is a pittance to what we pay out in
medical bills and suffering.”

As he learned more about the blast and the
impacts of the nuclear industry on his native community, about five years
ago Pino joined with the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium, an activist
group in New Mexico that promotes awareness for those affected by nuclear
activities and exposure to radiation.

Pino and the Downwinders join a
diverse group of interests across New Mexico who’ve put aside their
differences to oppose Holtec International’s plan to send nuclear waste
stranded at nuclear power plants across the country to a 1,000-acre site in
the New Mexico desert halfway between Carlsbad and Hobbs.

 Carlsbad Current Argus 5th Feb 2022

https://eu.currentargus.com/story/news/local/2022/02/05/human-impacts-new-mexico-nuclear-industry-haunts-proposed-waste-project/9171553002/

February 7, 2022 Posted by | health, indigenous issues, USA | Leave a comment

UK close to opening coal mine under Marine Conservation Zone just 5 miles from Sellafield nuclear facility!

 The Coal Mine planning inspector Stephen Normington will, any day now, be
making his recommendation to government (the same government who have
appointed the coal boss as nuclear dump advisor). Then the final decision
will be with Secretary of State Michael Gove on whether or not to open a
new coal mine under the Marine Conservation Zone off St Bees and just five
miles from Sellafield. Concerns, aside from climate, raised by Keep
Cumbrian Coal in the Hole since 2017, regarding seismic, nuclear and marine
impacts have been well and truly ‘talked over’ despite our vehement
campaigning.

 Keep Cumbrian Coal in the Hole 5th Feb 2022

Flying Underwater

February 7, 2022 Posted by | environment, UK | Leave a comment

As Ukraine Crisis Raises Specter of Nuclear War, Veterans Call for Disarmament and Peace.

As Ukraine Crisis Raises Specter of Nuclear War, Veterans Call for Disarmament and Peace,  https://www.laprogressive.com/veterans-call-for-disarmament/    Gerry Condon, 5 Feb 22, The US/NATO showdown with Russia over Ukraine is a stark reminder of how close the world is to a possible nuclear war.  The one-sided reporting in the U.S. media, with little historical context, is what we see whenever the U.S. is getting ready to go to war.  The lack of any meaningful opposition in Congress, even from supposed progressive Democrats, is alarming.  Are there no adults in the room? 

Is President Biden a captive of the neocons and their patrons in the weapons-of-mass-destruction industry?  Is the tail wagging the dog?  No wonder the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists is maintaining its Doomsday Clock at only 100 seconds from midnight. 

We can hope that quiet diplomacy taking place in the background will overshadow the stubborn public refusal to acknowledge Russia’s understandable security concerns.  Can you imagine the U.S. response if Russia was positioning missile systems and troops in Canada or Mexico? 

Given that the U.S. and Russia possess the lion’s share of nuclear weapons – over 6,000 each – the world will breathe a collective sigh of relief if war is avoided. But how long before the next crisis? Is the world really safer with nuclear “deterrence” (aka “mutually assured destruction”)?

The Pentagon is currently putting its finishing touches on the Biden Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review.  Rumors are that it will not reflect President Biden’s stated goal of reducing the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. security defense strategy.  It will not call for the U.S. to adopt a policy of No First Use of nuclear weapons.  It will not call for the U.S. to sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. It will not call on the U.S. to adhere to its obligations under the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which require it to negotiate in good faith to reduce and eventual eliminate all nuclear weapons.

Veterans For Peace has therefore stepped up to provide its own Nuclear Posture Review, one that abandons the policy of full spectrum dominance and replaces it with full spectrum cooperation. 

“Veterans are all too familiar with the horrible costs of war,” says retired Marine Corps Major Ken Mayers, who serves on the Board of Veterans For Peace.  “It is appropriate that military veterans are standing up for nuclear disarmament and peace.”

The Veterans For Peace document reviews the U.S. posture toward each of the nuclear-armed states, plus Iran, which has no nuclear weapons.  The veterans call on the U.S. to take immediate steps to reduce the risk of accidental nuclear war, such as implementing a No First Use policy and taking nuclear missiles off hair trigger alert.  It calls on the U.S. to sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

“If the United States takes the first steps toward eliminating nuclear weapons, other nuclear-armed states will follow,” says Ken Mayers of Veterans For Peace. “This is the kind of leadership that the people of the world want to see today.”

The Veterans For Peace Nuclear Posture Review contains sixteen specific proposals for reducing the risk of nuclear war and building momentum for nuclear disarmament.  Veterans For Peace is sending it to President Biden, to Vice President Kamala Harris, and to every Member of Congress.

The current crisis over Ukraine demonstrates what a dangerously unstable world we are living in today. The elimination of nuclear weapons must go hand-in-hand with non-intervention in the internal affairs of other nations, as called for in the UN Charter.  If we prioritize mutual respect among all peoples, we can survive the current crisis and avoid a future war that could literally destroy human civilization.

February 7, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

US Grants Sanctions Relief To Iran,Inches Closer To Nuclear Deal Renewal


US Grants Sanctions Relief To Iran,Inches Closer To Nuclear Deal Renewal, Kashmir Observer 

Agencies | February 5, 2022  Washington- The Biden administration has restored a sanctions waiver to Iran, a senior State Department official said on Friday, as indirect talks between the United States and Iran on returning to the 2015 nuclear agreement entered the final stretch.

The waiver, which was rescinded by the Trump administration in May 2020, had allowed Russian, Chinese and European companies to carry out non-proliferation work at Iranian nuclear sites.

The waiver was needed to allow for technical discussions that were key to the talks about return to the deal formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), a State Department official said…………..  https://kashmirobserver.net/2022/02/05/us-grants-sanctions-relief-to-iraninches-closer-to-nuclear-deal-renewal/

February 7, 2022 Posted by | Iran, politics international | Leave a comment

In New Mexico, two Bills to block the storage of high level nuclear waste

Efforts by New Mexico lawmakers to block the storage of high-level nuclear
waste in the state built momentum this week as two bills in the House and
Senate advanced in legislative committees.

Senate Bill 54 and House Bill
127 contain identical language that would prohibit State agencies from
issuing permits for high-level nuclear waste storage facilities, introduced
in direct opposition to the project proposed by Holtec International in
southeast New Mexico near Carlsbad and Hobbs. The Holtec project would see
about 100,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel rods from generator sites
across the U.S. shipped via rail to the location on about 1,000 acres in a
remote area by the Eddy-Lea county line.

 Carlsbad Current-Argus 5th Feb 2022

https://eu.currentargus.com/story/news/local/2022/02/05/new-mexico-nuclear-waste-storage-ban-gains-steam-holtec-project-carlsbad-hobbs/9302663002/

February 7, 2022 Posted by | politics, UK, wastes | Leave a comment

BBC Inside Science Nuclear Waste Podcast Kicks Off With a Big Fat Lie – Fact Check!?


BBC Inside Science Nuclear Waste Podcast Kicks Off With a Big Fat Lie – Fact Check!? https://www.lakesagainstnucleardump.com/post/bbc-inside-science-nuclear-waste-podcast-kicks-off-with-a-big-fat-lie-fact-check

Listen to BBC Inside Science Here Reporting from the BBC which holds the newly “green” nuclear industry to account has been in short supply and this was no exception despite the promising headline.

Listen to BBC Inside Science Here Reporting from the BBC which holds the newly “green” nuclear industry to account has been in short supply and this was no exception despite the promising headline. The podcast kicked off with some big fat lies about nuclear being low carbon (radioactive carbon it produces in spades) and stating that “Sizewell C will produce 7% of the UKs energy needs.” “Inside Science” is the arbiter of truth for many people including Cumbrian politicians who have repeated these lies. Sizewell C would only produce 2% of the UKs energy needs – an amount that could easily be saved by insulating houses. What the podcast presenter should have said was that Sizewell C may produce up to 7% of the UK’s ELECTRICITY – rather different from ENERGY and a big fat lie that the nuclear industry likes to promote.

Professor Claire Corkhill did reveal some home- truths about nuclear such as reprocessing produces a net result of more hazardous waste and that low level waste does not equate to low hazard “it is still hazardous.” When the interviewer asked Professor Corkhill if digging a big hole for nuclear waste was expensive the reply was that ‘its the right thing to do and it means that future generations won’t have the expense.’ This is the mantra that the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management like to promote as a truism. It is the wrong thing to do and denies future generations the ability to protect themselves from nuclear waste. Professor Corkhill was appointed to the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management ( CoRWM) in January 2020. Mark Kirkbride the CEO of West Cumbria Mining was appointed to CoRWM in November 2019 and has been putting together costings for the digging of a big hole or two. The total cost of decommissioning is around £132 Billion and counting. The eyewatering amounts of money are the very least of the bottomless Bill that this and future generations will be picking up from the nuclear experiment in any event.

February 7, 2022 Posted by | media, UK | Leave a comment

Movie on assassination of nuclear scientist Dariush Rezainejad premieres at FajrCulture

Movie on assassination of nuclear scientist Dariush Rezainejad premieres at Fajr Culture. Tehran Times, February 6, 2022 TEHRAN – “Henas”, a drama about the assassination of nuclear scientist Dariush Rezainejad, premiered at the 40th Fajr Film Festival on Saturday.

35-year-old Rezainejad was shot dead by Mossad gunmen before the eyes of his wife and little girl in front of his house in Tehran in July, 2011. The movie portrays the terrorist attack through the eyes of his wife.

We never intended to make a spy drama,” director Hossein Darabi said in a press conference after the premiere of the film.

“Due to the fact that the subject is a matter of great security sensitivity, we wanted to portray the feelings of the wife in that situation,” he added.

He noted that the story of the film has been written based on Rezainejad’s life story and has its roots in reality.

“There is no point in the film in conflict with reality,” said Rezainejad’s widow, Shoreh Pirani, who was in attendance at the screening and press conference……………………….  https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/469877/Movie-on-assassination-of-nuclear-scientist-Dariush-Rezainejad

February 7, 2022 Posted by | Iran, media | Leave a comment

Decommissioning is just the beginning of the huge nuclear legacy problem

Nuclear power concerns outlast decommissioning, Great Lakes Echo,   By Cameryn Cass 4 Feb 22,

Editor’s note: This is part of a package of two articles and a podcast about nuclear power in Michigan.

As Michigan and other states gradually move away from coal and other brown energy sources, there’s growing interest in carbon-free alternatives, including nuclear energy,

As Michigan and other states gradually move away from coal and other brown energy sources, there’s growing interest in carbon-free alternatives, including nuclear energy, which some advocates call a “clean alternative” that now fuels 30% of Michigan’s total electricity.

One nuclear plant in the state, Big Rock Point in Charlevoix closed in 1997 and has been fully decommissioned. In the spring of 2022, the Palisades Nuclear Plant in Southwest Michigan’s Van Buren County will close because of a “business decision.”

Michigan also has the Fermi Nuclear Power Plant in Newport, near Monroe, and the Donald C. Cook Nuclear Power Plant in Berrien County’s Bridgman, according to the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy.

With Palisades and other plants in the Great Lakes region scheduled to shut down in the coming decades, more people are considering the long-term impacts of this energy source.

After decommissioning, radioactive waste remains on-site, said Susan Chiblow, an Indigenous environmental scholar in Ontario.

The waste stays in the environment for trillions of years, so calling nuclear power clean is propaganda, she said.

In short, risks don’t disappear when a plant is decommissioned, a process that can take up to 60 years, said Edwin Lyman, the nuclear safety project director at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit science advocacy organization based in Massachusetts.

Although closed plants no longer have to worry about accidents post shut-down, their operators remain responsible for managing the radiated materials and spent nuclear waste, Lyman said.

He said waste now stored on-site is vulnerable to security threats and climate disasters.

For five years, the waste is kept in large swimming pool-like structures where it’s mixed with water to keep it cool. Then, it’s transferred to dry casks, he said.

The U.S. Department of Energy is technically responsible for removing the waste, but it has nowhere to bring it, Lyman said.

“It’s going to be a long-term storage problem for any nuclear plant that’s shut down,” Lyman said……………………………

Thirteen states have banned construction of new nuclear plants.

In the Great Lakes region, Minnesota adopted its ban in 1994. ……

Because the Great Lakes account for one-fifth of the world’s freshwater, Chiblow and other environmentalists are especially interested in protecting it……….c

February 5, 2022 Posted by | decommission reactor, USA | 4 Comments

Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA) demands deadly plutonium stockpile be placed ‘out of use’

The Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA) of the UK and Ireland has called for Britain’s deadly Plutonium stockpile to be placed ‘out of use’, for an early end to reprocessing, and for greater accountability and more transparency about the long-term management of radioactive materials arising from decommissioning operations at the UK’s former nuclear power plants.

The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) is the agency charged with making safe and cleaning closed civil nuclear plants. It has just published a draft Business Plan for 2022-5 and invited comments.

In its response, the NFLA also expressed its disappointment that reprocessing at Sellafield did not end in 2020 as was originally promised and that there isstill no clear end date.

The NFLA also wants to see a comprehensive inventory of all radioactive materials created for each site, including those arising from decommissioning operations, and for local authorities to be consulted over arrangements for their transport and management.

 NFLA 3rd Feb 2022

NFLA demands deadly plutonium stockpile be placed ‘out of use’

February 5, 2022 Posted by | - plutonium, UK | Leave a comment

Bill To Ban Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage In New Mexico Passes House Committee

“It’s inconceivable why New Mexico has to be the dumping ground for the nation’s ill-advised investment in nuclear energy and nuclear weapons,” said Paul Gibson, co-founder of Retake Our Democracy. “The risk to our community is far greater than the benefit.”

Although the site is termed temporary, Holtec is seeking a 40-year license to operate there, which opponents say would make it permanent.

By SCOTT WYLAND, The Santa Fe New Mexican, 4 Feb 22, A bill clearly aimed at blocking Holtec International from building an underground storage site for spent nuclear fuel in southeastern New Mexico is moving forward.

The House Energy, Environment and Natural Resources Committee voted 5-4 to advance a bill that would ban the storage or disposal of spent nuclear fuel in the state — and would essentially kill Holtec’s plans to build a repository for this high-level radioactive waste in the Carlsbad area.

It now will go to the House Judiciary Committee.

A key point in the debate was whether the state has the authority to stop the federal government from approving what’s described as an interim storage site to keep the material until a permanent place is created.

Some lawmakers and regulators who back House Bill 127 say although the state can’t interfere with how the commission regulates the waste, it can block storage sites that could cause adverse environmental impacts.

The bill’s opponents argue the state still would be preempting the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s authority in managing commercial nuclear waste. That simply is not allowed, no matter what criteria the state uses, they said.

But Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, who strongly supports the bill, said the state is well within its rights to say no to nuclear disposal sites that could contaminate vital resources, such as groundwater, and pose risks to communities when the waste is transported by rail across the country.

“Does New Mexico have the authority to do this? Yes, we do,” Steinborn said. “The Nuclear Regulatory Commission absolutely has primacy over regulating spent fuel. But what we’re talking here is the siting of this material, and our concerns on multiple grounds.”

Still, Rep. Larry Scott, R-Hobbs, contends the federal government’s power to regulate radioactive material overrides any state authority, including on environmental matters.

“I’m looking at your legislation, which seems to completely contradict that,” Scott said.

Last year, the state sued the federal government, contending the commission hadn’t done enough to ensure Holtec’s proposed site wouldn’t harm the environment, communities or the oil and gas industry in one of the nation’s richest fossil fuel regions.

Although the site is termed temporary, Holtec is seeking a 40-year license to operate there, which opponents say would make it permanent.

State Deputy Environment Secretary Rebecca Roose said no permanent disposal site has been established, so the waste has nowhere else to go.

“It’s more likely to stay there — the inertia will be to keep it there as opposed to move it someplace else permanent,” Roose said, “if and when a permanent facility is identified.”…………………

The bill’s proponents say it’s necessary to prevent a massive amount of high-level radioactive waste from coming to New Mexico and disproportionately affecting poor and minority communities.

“It’s inconceivable why New Mexico has to be the dumping ground for the nation’s ill-advised investment in nuclear energy and nuclear weapons,” said Paul Gibson, co-founder of Retake Our Democracy. “The risk to our community is far greater than the benefit.” https://ladailypost.com/bill-to-ban-spent-nuclear-fuel-storage-in-new-mexico-passes-house-committee/ 

February 5, 2022 Posted by | politics, USA, wastes | Leave a comment

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