‘Nobody Believes in Our Victory Like I Do.’ Inside Volodymyr Zelensky’s Struggle to Keep Ukraine in the Fight
Public support for aid to #Ukraine has been in decline for months in the U.S., and Zelensky’s visit did nothing to revive it.
Despite the recent setbacks on the battlefield, he does not intend to give up fighting or to sue for any kind of peace. On the contrary, his belief in Ukraine’s ultimate victory over Russia has hardened into a form that worries some of his advisers. It is immovable, verging on the messianic. “He deludes himself,” one of his closest aides tells me in frustration. “We’re out of options. We’re not winning. But try telling him that.
The cold will also make military advances more difficult, locking down the front lines at least until the spring. But Zelensky has refused to accept that.
with the outbreak of war in Israel. The focus of Ukraine’s allies in the U.S. and Europe, and of the global media, quickly shifted to the Gaza Strip………………. on its own, Ukraine aid no longer stands much of a chance in Washington.
At the start of the Russian invasion, Zelensky’s mission was to maintain the sympathy of humankind. Now his task is more complicated. In his foreign trips and presidential phone calls, he needs to convince world leaders that helping Ukraine is in their own national interests, that it will, as Biden put it, “pay dividends.” Achieving that gets harder as global crises multiply.
BY SIMON SHUSTER/KYIV, NOVEMBER 1, 2023 , ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: OCTOBER 30, 2023 https://time.com/6329188/ukraine-volodymyr-zelensky-interview/
Volodymyr Zelensky was running late.
The invitation to his speech at the National Archives in Washington had gone out to several hundred guests, including congressional leaders and top officials from the Biden Administration. Billed as the main event of his visit in late September, it would give him a chance to inspire U.S. support against Russia with the kind of oratory the world has come to expect from Ukraine’s wartime President. It did not go as planned.
That afternoon, Zelensky’s meetings at the White House and the Pentagon delayed him by more than an hour, and when he finally arrived to begin his speech at 6:41 p.m., he looked distant and agitated. He relied on his wife, First Lady Olena Zelenska, to carry his message of resilience on the stage beside him, while his own delivery felt stilted, as though he wanted to get it over with. At one point, while handing out medals after the speech, he urged the organizer to hurry things along.
The reason, he later said, was the exhaustion he felt that night, not only from the demands of leadership during the war but also the persistent need to convince his allies that, with their help, Ukraine can win. “Nobody believes in our victory like I do. Nobody,” Zelensky told TIME in an interview after his trip. Instilling that belief in his allies, he said, “takes all your power, your energy. You understand? It takes so much of everything.”
It is only getting harder. Twenty months into the war, about a fifth of Ukraine’s territory remains under Russian occupation. Tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed, and Zelensky can feel during his travels that global interest in the war has slackened. So has the level of international support.
Continue readingTargeting Gaza From US Spy Hub in Australia
Peter Cronau reports on Canberra’s secret support for Israel’s brutal assault on Palestinians in Gaza through NSA intelligence satellites in the U.S. Pine Gap base near Alice Springs.
Peter Cronau, Declassified Australia https://consortiumnews.com/2023/11/03/targeting-gaza-from-us-spy-hub-in-australia/
The Pine Gap U.S. surveillance base located outside of Alice Springs in Australia is collecting an enormous range of communications and electronic intelligence from the brutal Gaza-Israel battlefield — and this data is being provided to the Israel Defence Forces.
Two large Orion geosynchronous signals intelligence satellites, belonging to the U.S. and operated from Pine Gap, are located 36,000 kms above the equator over the Indian Ocean. Frosxxxdxxxxxm there, they look down on the Middle East, Europe and Africa, and gather huge amounts of intelligence data to beam back to the Pine Gap base.xxxxxc
After collecting and analysing the communications and intelligence data for the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), Pine Gap is providing it to the Israel Defence Forces, as it steps up its brutal assault on Palestinians in the Gaza enclave.
Pine Gap facility is monitoring the Gaza Strip and surrounding areas with all its resources, and gathering intelligence assessed to be useful to Israel,” a former Pine Gap employee has told Declassified Australia.
David Rosenberg worked inside Pine Gap as “team leader of weapon signals analysis” for 18 years until 2008. He is a 23-year veteran of the NSA.
“Pine Gap has satellites overhead. Every one of those assets would be on those locations, looking for anything that could help them.”
“Pine Gap facility is monitoring the Gaza Strip and surrounding areas with all its resources, and gathering intelligence assessed to be useful to Israel.”
Rosenberg says the personnel at Pine Gap are tasked with collecting signals such as “command and control” centres in Gaza, with Hamas headquarters often located near hospitals, schools and other civilian structures. “The aim would be to minimise casualties to non-combatants in achieving their objective of destroying Hamas.”
Since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel that killed over 1,400 Israelis, both military and civilian, the Israel Defence Forces has bombed hundreds of targets inside Gaza, killing far more than Hamas militants. An estimated 9,000 people so far have been killed, including most shockingly 3,600 children.
United Nations agencies have deplored the nearly four-week Israeli bombing campaign saying,
“Gaza has become a ‘graveyard’ for children with thousands now killed under Israeli bombardment, while more than a million face dire shortages of essentials and a lifetime of trauma ahead.”
Pine Gap’s Global Role
The sprawling satellite ground station outside Alice Springs, officially titled Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap (JDFPG), has been described as the United States’ second most important surveillance base globally.
About half the 800 personnel working at the Central Australian base are American, with Australian government employees making up fewer than 100 of the increasingly privatised staff.
The base is no mere passive communication collector. Personnel at the Pine Gap base provide vital detailed analysis and reporting on SIGINT (signals intelligence) and ELINT (electronic intelligence) it collects.
As well as surveillance of civilian, commercial and military communications, it provides detailed geolocation intelligence to the U.S. military that can be used to locate with precision targets in the battlefield.
This was first conclusively documented in a secret NSA document, titled “Site Profile,” leaked from the Edward Snowden archive to this writer and first published by ABC Australia in 2017:
“RAINFALL [Pine Gap’s NSA codename] detects, collects, records, processes, analyses and reports on PROFORMA signals collected from tasked target entities.”
These PROFORMA signals are the communications data of radar and weapon systems collected in near real-time — they likely would include remote launch signals for Hamas rockets, as well as any threatened missile launches from Lebanon or Iran.
“Pine Gap detects, collects, records, processes, analyses and reports on PROFORMA signals collected from tasked target entities.
This present war in Gaza is not the first time the dishes of Pine Gap have assisted Israel’s military with intelligence, including the detecting of incoming missiles, according to this previous report.
“During the [1991] Gulf War, Israeli reports praised Australia for relaying Scud missile launch warnings from the Nurrungar joint U.S.-Australian facility in South Australia, a task now assigned to Pine Gap.”
During the early stages of the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, the NSA installed a data link to send early warning of any Iraqi missile launches detected directly to Israel’s Air Force headquarters at Tel Nof airbase, south of Tel Aviv.
Israel’s Access to ‘Five Eye’ Jewels
The NSA “maintains a far-reaching technical and analytic relationship with the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU),” according to documents published by The Intercept in 2014. The documents show the NSA and ISNU are “sharing information on access, intercept, targeting, language, analysis and reporting.”
“This SIGINT relationship has increasingly been the catalyst for a broader intelligence relationship between the United States and Israel.
“The Israeli side enjoys the benefits of expanded geographic access to world-class NSA cryptanalytic and SIGINT engineering expertise.”
It’s thanks to the Pine Gap base, with its satellites so strategically positioned to monitor the Middle East region, along with its targeting and analysis capability, that Israel is able to make use of these benefits.
Another leaked document, a targeting exchange agreement from the U.K.’s surveillance agency, GCHQ, reveals one of the “specific intelligence topics” shared among the NSA, GCHQ and ISNU was “Palestinians.” The document states that “due to the sensitivities” of Israeli involvement that particular program does not include direct targeting of Palestinians themselves.
The NSA considers their intelligence-sharing arrangement as being “beneficial to both NSA’s and ISNU’s mission and intelligence requirements.”
This wide intelligence sharing arrangement potentially opens up to the Israelis the “jewels” of the Five Eye global surveillance system collected by the NSA global surveillance network, including by Australia’s Pine Gap base.
Declassified Australia asked a series of questions of the Australian Defence Department about the role of the Pine Gap base in the Israel-Gaza war, and about the legal protections that may be in place to defend personnel of the base should legal charges of war crimes be laid. No response was received by deadline.
Peter Cronau is an award-winning investigative journalist, writer, and film-maker. His documentaries have appeared on ABC TV’s Four Corners and Radio National’s Background Briefing. He is an editor and cofounder of DECLASSIFIED AUSTRALIA. He is co-editor of the recent book A Secret Australia – Revealed by the WikiLeaks Exposés.
This article is from Declassified Australia. #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes #Israel #Palestine
“Enhanced regulation” as Aurora – new £2.5bn plutonium facility – is added to UK”s AWE Aldermaston
Project Aurora, a new plutonium manufacturing facility at AWE Aldermaston
was added to the government’s 2023 list of major projects, and is
currently estimated to cost between £2bn and £2.5bn. The facility, which
was originally planned as part of the Nuclear Warhead Capability
Sustainment Programme (NWCSP) at AWE, will likely replace the current A90
facility at Aldermaston, which was built in the 1990s.
Nuclear Information Service 31st Oct 2023
The Chief Nuclear Inspector’s 2023 annual report has revealed that AWE
Aldermaston and the Devonport Royal Dockyard (DRDL) are to remain under
enhanced regulatory attention. Aldermaston has been under enhanced
attention since 2013 and Devonport since 2014. Of the three categories of
regulatory attention used by the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR),
enhanced is the second highest. The highest category is used only for the
four most hazardous facilities at Sellafield. ONR said that for both sites
the decision for them to remain in this category was due to “longstanding
issues”.
Nuclear Information Service 31st Oct 2023 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes #plutonium
Magnox rebrands to Nuclear Restoration Services as its decommissioning portfolio expands
Magnox has become Nuclear Restoration Services (NRS) ahead of taking
ownership of closing EDF nuclear sites. NRS, part of the UK’s Nuclear
Decommissioning Authority (NDA) group, is responsible for safely
decommissioning first generation nuclear reactor and research sites across
the UK and restoring them for future use.
As Magnox, the company was
responsible for safe and secure cleanup of 12 nuclear sites. In April, it
additionally took on the decommissioning of the Dounreay nuclear site in
Scotland when it merged with Dounreay Site Restoration (DSR).
The site is owned by NDA, but DSR was contracted to deliver its decommissioning
programme. Two years ago, it was agreed that NDA would become responsible
for decommissioning EDF’s seven advanced gas-cooled reactors (AGRs), once
power generation had ended and defueling had been completed. Hunterston B
was the first AGR to come offline in January last year, followed by Hinkley
Point B in August 2022. EDF expects all the sites will stop operating by
2028. Ownership of Hunterston B is expected to transfer in 2026, with the
others to follow on a rolling basis over the next decade.
The Chemical Engineer 2nd Nov 2023
https://www.thechemicalengineer.com/news/magnox-rebrands-to-nuclear-restoration-services-as-its-decommissioning-portfolio-expands/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNuke
Taiwan Cabinet officials clarify that nuclear power is not “green”
BY GIORGIO LEALI, OCTOBER 31, 2023 https://en.rti.org.tw/news/view/id/2010213
A Cabinet spokesperson on Wednesday said that nuclear power does not qualify as “green energy”, despite recent comments made by Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁). Cabinet Spokesperson Lin Tze-luen (林子倫) was responding to Chen’s comments in the legislature the previous day.
During questions from legislators on Tuesday, Chen said that nuclear energy is green energy, but that the issue of nuclear waste disposal must also be taken into account. Lin says that several people including Chen himself and Economic Minister Wang Mei-hua (王美花) have all made clarifying comments. Wang in her comments said that although nuclear power generates very few emissions, that does not necessarily define it as “green”. She says that is why international environmental organizations such as RE100 do not list nuclear energy as green.
Lin says that some media reports did not faithfully report the full context of the premier’s comments, which could be misleading. He adds a nuclear-free Taiwan remains the national consensus and that the government’s position has not changed. He says the government continues to move ahead with its four goals of reducing coal, increasing gas, developing green energy, and denuclearizing. He adds that the government will also continue working toward the goal of net-zero carbon emissions by the year 2050. #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Civilian casualties in Gaza don’t matter – top US senator
Lindsey Graham insists no amount of Palestinian deaths should make the Washington put the brakes on Israel
https://www.rt.com/news/586356-senator-graham-no-limit-civilian-casualties-gaza/ 1 Nov 23
The US should stand by Israel in its campaign against Hamas no matter how heavy a toll it takes on the civilian population in Gaza, Senator Lindsey Graham has argued. He likened Israel’s military operation against the militants to the allies’ struggle against Nazi Germany and Japan during World War II.
In an interview with CNN on Tuesday, Graham was asked if there was a “threshold” for him, after which he would start questioning Israel’s tactics. The Republican replied in the negative, saying there is no limit as to “what Israel should do to the people who are trying to slaughter the Jews.”
“This idea that Israel has to apologize for attacking Hamas, who’s embedded with their own population, needs to stop,” the senator insisted, adding that it is Hamas that is “creating these casualties – not Israel.”
Graham noted that Israel does need to “be smart” by trying to “limit civilian casualties.” The lawmaker also called for the delivery of humanitarian aid to “areas that protect the innocent.”
During his visit to Israel last month, US President Joe Biden assured Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that “as long as the United States stands, and we will stand forever, we will not let you ever be alone.”
Soon after Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel last month, Washington scrambled to provide its long-standing ally with additional defense aid worth billions of dollars.
The US has also deployed two aircraft carrier groups and other naval assets, a squadron of F-16 fighter jets, air-defense systems, and 900 troops to the Middle East, saying this increased military presence should serve as a deterrent to other states tempted to join the conflict.
Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the director of the UN’s human rights office (OHCHR) in New York, Craig Mokhiber, described Israel’s actions in Gaza as a “text-book case of genocide” and the “wholesale slaughter of the Palestinian people, rooted in an ethno-nationalist settler colonial ideology.”
The official handed in his resignation, arguing that the UN had failed in its duty to prevent the killing of Palestinian civilians. He claimed that the international organization had “surrendered to the power of the US” and given in to the “Israeli lobby.”
Mokhiber also accused European nations of being “complicit in the horrific assault” on Gaza and “giving political and diplomatic cover for Israel’s atrocities.”
Echoing Mokhiber’s assessment on Tuesday in Geneva, a spokesman for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), James Elder, claimed that “Gaza has become a graveyard for thousands of children,” and a “living hell for everyone else.” He called for a humanitarian ceasefire in the Palestinian enclave.
The conflict has so far left more than 1,400 Israelis and over 8,000 Palestinians dead, with thousands more injured. #Israel #Palestine
Book review of “Too Hot to Touch: The Problem of High-Level Nuclear Waste”
This is a book review of “Too Hot to Touch: The Problem of High-Level
Nuclear Waste” and the best book I’ve read on the topic, as well as
additional research on the topic. Now that world wide production of
conventional and unconventional oil probably peaked in 2018 (coal in 2013,
and perhaps natural gas in 2019), our top priority should be to bury
nuclear wastes as soon as possible. Once severe shortages arrive, remaining
oil will to to agriculture and other essential needs. This short window of
time now may be our only chance to bury nuclear wastes — our descendants
certainly won’t have the energy, diesel equipment, or technology. Yucca
mountain is the best possible place to put nuclear waste in the U.S. The
only place to put it actually, a $15 billion facility that models put
through thousands of permutations of multiple calamities such as
earthquakes, volcanoes, flooding and more. Yucca was found to be a safe
place to put nuclear waste.
Energy Skeptic 1st Nov 2023 https://energyskeptic.com/2023/book-review-nuclear-waste-too-hot-to-touch/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Netanyahu Rejects Calls for Ceasefire as Gaza Death Toll Surpasses 8,300
By Chris Walker , TRUTHOUT, October 31, 2023 https://truthout.org/articles/netanyahu-rejects-calls-for-ceasefire-as-gaza-death-toll-surpasses-8300/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=cd5af912ac-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_3_20_2023_13_41_COPY_06&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-cd5af912ac-650192793&mc_cid=cd5af912ac&mc_eid=73e1cd43d0
Hundreds of thousands of protesters worldwide have demanded an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and an end to the occupation.By Chris Walker , TRUTHOUTPublishedOctober 31, 2023
sraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected international calls for an Israeli ceasefire in Gaza during a press conference on Monday.
Since the Hamas-led infiltration attack on October 7 that killed around 1,400 people, Israeli forces have waged a genocidal bombing campaign against Palestinians, killing more than 8,300 people in Gaza — more than a third of whom are children, according to the latest figures from the Gaza Health Ministry. Thousands more Gazans are estimated to be trapped under the rubble.
Israeli airstrikes have displaced millions of Gazans from their homes, many of whom are now struggling to survive — and resorting to drinking contaminated sea water — as Israel blocks food, water, electricity and medicine from entering Gaza.
“Just as the United States would not agree to a cease-fire after Pearl Harbor or after the terrorist attack of 9/11, Israel will not agree to a cessation of hostilities with Hamas after the horrific attacks of October 7,” Netanyahu told reporters on Monday.
Netanyahu’s comments come as hundreds of thousands of protesters worldwide have demanded an immediate ceasefire and for Israel to allow desperately needed aid into Gaza, as well as for an end to Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land. Although Netanyahu has claimed that aid has been reaching those in need, observers on the ground have disputed these claims.
“Very few trucks, slow processes, strict inspections, supplies that do not match the requirements of UNRWA and the other aid organizations, and mostly the ongoing ban on fuel, are all a recipe for a failed system,” read a report from Thomas White, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency’s top official for Gaza.
Hundreds of thousands of people protested against the Israeli military’s siege of Gaza in cities across the globe over the weekend, including in Melbourne, Australia; London, United Kingdom; Toronto, Canada; New York, United States; Rome, Italy; Amman, Jordan; Berlin, Germany; Pretoria, South Africa; and more.
Netanyahu, who faces calls to resign from his role as prime minister for failing to prevent the October 7 attack from Hamas, didn’t appear to be moved by the calls for a ceasefire and an end to the occupation. “This is a time for war,” he said instead.
Meanwhile, residents of Israel appear to be changing their views on the attacks in Gaza. Polling from last week, taken prior to the Israeli military launching a ground campaign, indicates that close to one in two Israeli residents (49 percent) wanted the Israel Defense Forces to pause consideration of such moves, with only 29 percent stating they wanted the military to immediately launch a ground campaign, a decrease from a poll asking the same question a week before.
Other polling taken earlier this month found that the vast majority of Israeli residents agree that Netanyahu was largely responsible for failing to prepare for an attack from Hamas, with 80 percent in that poll saying so.
Evidence suggests that Netanyahu did in fact have advance warning about the Hamas attack on October 7. Egyptian officials say they repeatedly warned the prime minister days ahead of the attack that the action from Hamas was imminent. Netanyahu’s office has denied that they received any information from Egypt, although the chairman of the U.S. House Intelligence Committee, Texas Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, has said that he and other members have seen evidence of the warnings. #srael #Palestine
Deb Katz: There’s no end in sight to the crisis in nuclear waste
Clean water, clean air, clean land, and a safe place to live are our right. We must fight for the cleanup of all communities and stop the targeting of Black, brown and white communities alike to nuclear contamination.
November 1, 2023, by Deb Katz, executive director of the Citizen Awareness Network, based in Shelburne, Mass. https://vtdigger.org/2023/11/01/deb-katz-theres-no-end-in-sight-to-the-crisis-in-nuclear-waste/
What remains at the site of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant? Millions of curies of high-level waste on the banks of the Connecticut River with no destination, no solution.
The NorthStar plan? To ship its problem 2,000 miles away to Andrews County in Texas for “temporary storage.” The 5th Circuit shot down NorthStar’s plans to shuffle its toxic waste problem off on a working poor Hispanic community. This waste will be dangerous for a million years.
This is the colossal failure of nuclear power. There is no present solution to deal with the legacy of Vermont Yankee or any other reactor. This is the abject failure of the nuclear industry and the federal government.
The nuclear industry promised a solution by the time reactors shuttered. Sixty years later, there is no solution and no permanent solution forthcoming. There is waste with nowhere to go.
The industry routinely engages in environmental racism to deal with its waste problems. It is reprehensible. The industry targets working poor, people of color, and Indigenous tribes for its nuclear fuel chain. It pits reactor and targeted communities against each other over who will suffer nuclear power’s final solution.
Citizens Awareness Network opposes these false solutions. Without a permanent repository, any establishment of centralized interim storage is merely a way to make the industry’s waste problem disappear. Potentially it will de facto become the industry’s “permanent” solution.
We can’t accept that another community will suffer to clean our community up. We accept that the waste must remain onsite until the government does its job. This isn’t easy.
Dangers remain, whether from acts of malice or climate disruption. Vermont Yankee’s canisters sit in the open on a pad on the banks of the river.
The National Governors’ Council stated that the high-level nuclear waste at reactor sites were pre-deployed weapons of mass destruction. It urged Congress to take action to protect these sites. Congress has yet to act.
Then there is climate change. The National Academy of Science in February began a study to address what it calls “probability of maximum precipitation” events. The study focuses on infrastructure, dams and energy generation including nuclear sites. It addresses their vulnerability to PMP events. Included in the study are representatives from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Both acknowledged that there is no guidance in place to direct their actions to address these events and the vulnerability of these sites.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Geological Survey acknowledged that they were 20 years behind the curve in addressing these issues. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission acknowledged that the agency concerns were raised in response to the Fukushima accident.
For all its claims, nuclear power is neither clean nor green. It is a dirty, toxic technology. It relies on its invisibility to keep its lies going.
Clean water, clean air, clean land, and a safe place to live are our right. We must fight for the cleanup of all communities and stop the targeting of Black, brown and white communities alike to nuclear contamination.
Nuclear Ban Treaty Members to Meet in November
Arms Control Association, November 2023, By Shizuka Kuramitsu
States-parties to the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) will hold their second meeting in New York on Nov. 27-Dec. 1. Amid the crisis facing the international arms control and disarmament regime, they are expected to review and continue implementing their plans for a total ban on nuclear weapons.
The TPNW, which entered into force on Jan. 22, 2021, bans states-parties from involvement in any nuclear weapons activities, including the use, threat of use, production, development, possession, and stationing of these weapons. Spearheaded by non-nuclear-armed states and civil society groups, the treaty originated from their frustration over the long stalemate among nuclear-weapon states to engage in serious nuclear disarmament as called for by the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).
At their first meeting, in June 2022, TPNW states-parties produced two documents aiming to advance the treaty, a 50-point action plan and a political statement. (See ACT, July/August 2022.)
They established three informal working groups to make progress during the intercessional period on important topics such as nuclear disarmament verification, victim assistance, environmental remediation, and universalization of the treaty. In addition, the action plan agreed to create a scientific advisory group, to implement gender provisions in the treaty, and to promote TPNW complementarity with existing treaties.
For the November meeting, each working group is preparing reports on their respective intersessional activities. The meeting is expected to issue a final document, according to the provisional agenda and government officials……………………………………………………… more https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2023-11/news/nuclear-ban-treaty-members-meet-november #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
How well protected are Ukraine’s nuclear power plants?
“This incident again underlines the extremely precarious nuclear safety situation in Ukraine, which will continue as long as this tragic war goes on,” Grossi said. “The fact that numerous windows at the site were destroyed shows just how close it was. Next time, we may not be so fortunate.”
DW, Lilia Rzheutska, 1 Nov 23
Ukrainian air defense systems recently downed Russian attack drones near the Khmelnitsky nuclear power plant. But falling debris still damaged the site. Are power plants in danger?
On the night of October 25, Ukrainian authorities reported downing Russian Shahed kamikaze drones near the Khmelnitsky nuclear power plant, in the country’s west. Falling debris and a wave of detonations caused significant damage to the town of Netishyn, where power plant employees live. The nearby town of Slavuta was also affected. Some buildings belonging to the nuclear facility itself were also damaged. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the drones were likely sent to attack the power plant.
Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) who are at the nuclear plant confirmed two loud explosions had occurred near the plant. They were later informed that two drones had been shot down at a distance of five and 20 kilometers, respectively.
AEA director General Rafael Grossi later stated on the organization’s website that powerful explosions near the power plant that night had temporarily cut off power to two radiation monitoring stations. According to Grossi, the detonations did not, however, disrupt the plant’s operations, nor did they affect the power grid. The explosion did, meanwhile, shatter several windows at the plant. “This incident again underlines the extremely precarious nuclear safety situation in Ukraine, which will continue as long as this tragic war goes on,” Grossi said. “The fact that numerous windows at the site were destroyed shows just how close it was. Next time, we may not be so fortunate.”
……………………………… A nuclear power plant is more than just a reactor, says Dmytro Humenyuk, who heads the safety and analysis unit of Ukraine’s scientific and technical center on nuclear and radiation safety. It is a complex facility that consists of safety systems that provides electricity for the plant itself, and transports power generated by the plant. Falling debris or shelling powerlines and substations could lead to a power outage at the nuclear power plant and trigger a dangerous situation, Humenjuk says.
High-voltage substations, through which electricity produced at the nuclear power plant is fed into the power grid and without which the facility cannot function safely, must be well protected from missile and drone attacks well as falling debris. “When substations come under fire, the nuclear power plant’s emergency protection is activated,” says nuclear energy expert Olha Kozharna. “Such an emergency stop is very dangerous for the power plants.”…………………………………………………………… https://www.dw.com/en/how-well-protected-are-ukraines-nuclear-power-plants/a-67271615 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
2
Australia must lobby US for ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapons, says ex-minister Gareth Evans
Former foreign minister says it is ‘sheer dumb luck’ that arms have not been used in the past 78 years and urges leadership on control measures
Daniel Hurst, Guardian, 1 Nov 23
Labor luminary and former foreign minister, Gareth Evans has urged Australia to lobby the US to promise “no first use” of nuclear weapons, warning that global arms control agreements “are now either dead or on life support”.
Evans says that in the wake of sealing the Aukus nuclear-powered submarine deal, the Albanese government should give “some comfort to ALP members and voters that we are really serious about nuclear arms control”.
Evans told Guardian Australia it was “sheer dumb luck” that the world had avoided a nuclear attack in the 78 years since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and “it is utterly wishful thinking to believe that this luck can continue in perpetuity”.
Evans joined arms control experts and former senior diplomats in urging the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, to take “a leadership role in addressing the rising nuclear threats in our region”.
Australia should appoint “a high-level envoy to engage our regional partners on an agenda of nuclear confidence building and preventive diplomacy measures”, according to a letter from the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (APLN).
While the group’s letter to Albanese is not specific about policy measures, Evans offered his own view that Australia’s status as a close US ally “gives us a particularly significant potential role” in pushing to reduce nuclear risks.
“The most immediately useful step we could take would be to support the growing international movement for the universal adoption of No First Use doctrine by the nuclear-armed states,” Evans told Guardian Australia…………………………………….
In a stark warning about the security environment, Evans said the risk of nuclear weapons being used through human error, miscalculation or system error was “greater than ever, not least given new developments in AI and cyber-offence capability”.
“Nearly 13,000 nuclear warheads are still in existence, with a combined destructive capability of close to 100,000 Hiroshima- or Nagasaki-sized bombs, and stockpiles, especially in our own Indo-Pacific region … are now growing again,” he said.
“The taboo against their deliberate use is weakening, with Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, talking up this prospect in language not heard since the height of the cold war.”
In addition to seeking universal support for “no first use”, Evans said other potential risk-reduction measures include cutting the number of weapons ready for immediate use……………………………………………….
The APLN letter gained support from high-powered experts including John Carlson, the former head of the Australian Safeguards and Non-Proliferation Office, and Ramesh Thakur, a former UN assistant secretary general.
Other signatories included John Tilemann, a former diplomat and international civil servant with the International Atomic Energy Agency, and Gary Quinlan, a former Australian ambassador to the UN.
The leader of the Greens in the Senate, Larissa Waters, backed the letter with the former Australian Democrats leader Natasha Stott Despoja and the former Labor minister for international development Melissa Parke. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/nov/01/australia-must-lobby-us-for-no-first-use-of-nuclear-weapons-says-ex-minister-gareth-evans #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Small modular nuclear reactor merger plan falls through
X-energy, Ares drop merger plan, 31 October 2023
Small modular reactor (SMR) and advanced fuel technology developer X-Energy Reactor Company – known as X-energy – and Ares Acquisition Corporation (AAC) have “mutually agreed to terminate their previously announced business combination agreement, effective immediately”.
In December last year, X-energy and AAC – a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company affiliated with global alternative investment manager Ares Management Corporation – entered into a definitive business combination agreement. The combination was set to establish X-energy as a publicly traded company, a move that was expected to accelerate the company’s growth strategy.
………………………………….., given challenging market conditions, peer-company trading performance and a balancing of the benefits and drawbacks of becoming a publicly traded company under current circumstances, X-energy and AAC jointly determined that it was the best course of action at this time not to proceed with their previously announced transaction.”
……………………….”In view of the termination of the Business Combination Agreement, AAC determined that it will not be able to consummate an initial business combination within the time period required by its amended and restated memorandum and articles of association,” the statement said. “As such, AAC intends to dissolve and liquidate in accordance with the provisions of the articles.”
X-energy is the developer of the Xe-100 pebble bed high-temperature gas reactor…………………… https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/X-energy,-Ares-drop-merger-plan #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Two more Japanese nuclear reactors granted 20-year extensions
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20231101_21/
Japan’s nuclear watchdog has approved extending the operation of two aging nuclear reactors in southwestern Japan for another 20 years.
The operational lifespan of Japanese reactors has been limited to 40 years in principle since the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant accident in 2011. But it can be extended by up to 20 years if the reactors pass screening by the Nuclear Regulation Authority.
At a meeting on Wednesday, the NRA granted extension approval to the No.1 and 2 reactors at the Sendai nuclear power plant in Kagoshima Prefecture, which is operated by the Kyushu Electric Power Company.
The No.1 reactor will turn 40 next July and the No.2 will reach that age in November 2025.
Discussed at the meeting were the results of special inspections of the reactors conducted by Kyushu Electric and an assessment that showed the reactors can be used for another 20 years.
The members of the meeting unanimously approved the extensions.
This decision brings the number of Japanese reactors whose operations have been extended beyond 40 years to six. The other four are the No.1 and No.2 reactors at the Takahama nuclear power plant and the No.3 reactor at the Mihama plant — all in Fukui Prefecture — as well as the Tokai No.2 plant’s reactor in Ibaraki Prefecture. #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Israel in Search of Its Hiroshima: Massive Bomb Wipes Out 20 Apt. Buildings, Kills, Wounds 400 Civilians
The flaw in the Israeli government stance is that we are not living in 1943. After World War II, the United Nations, the Geneva Conventions and other international instruments were enacted by the nations of the world to prevent the atrocities of WW II from being repeated. It was to this “rules-based international order” that the Biden administration appealed when it tried to rally the world to oppose Russian war crimes in Ukraine. In a gob-smacking act of supreme hypocrisy, the Biden administration has decided to throw the same rules-based international order on the garbage heap of special pleading when it comes to Israel.
By Juan Cole / Informed Comment
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – In one of the biggest massacres it has so far committed, the Israeli Air Force on Tuesday bombed the Jabaliyaa refugee camp in Gaza, killing or wounding at least 400 persons and destroying the Block Six residential complex, felling 20 buildings. More victims are believed to be under the rubble.
An Israeli military spokesman said that the strike was directed at Hamas leader Ibrahim Biari, a mastermind of the October 7 attack on Israel. Although Israeli authorities proclaimed that they had succeeded in killing Biari, Hamas announced that he was still very much alive.
Killing and wounding 400 noncombatants and destroying 20 residential buildings to get at one target, even if the target is a wanted terrorist, is strictly forbidden under the post-World War II laws of war and International Humanitarian law. These laws are codified in the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute that underpins the International Criminal Court.
For instance, Rome Statute:
Art. 8 (2) (b) (iv) Intentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause incidental loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects or widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment which would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage anticipated. (4th Geneva Convention Art. 85 (3) (b) of AP I.)
Art. 8 (2) (a) (iv) Extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly (mirrored from Geneva Conventions Art. 50/51/147 of GC I, II and IV).
Art. 8 (2) (b) (i) Intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such or against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities (4th Geneva Convention Art. 85 (3) (a), plus Art. 51(2) AP I).
Art. 8 (2) (b) (v) Attacking or bombarding, by whatever means, towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which are undefended and which are not military objectives. (4th Geneva Convention, Art. 85 (3) (d) of AP I).
The presence of one senior Hamas commander, or even a platoon of them, among hundreds of noncombatants clearly would not justify recklessly endangering innocent civilians on the scale of Jabaliyaa. This is a war crime pure and simple.
In a CNN interview by Wolf Blitzer of an Israeli military spokesman, Blitzer is clearly astonished that he straightforwardly admitted that the Israelis knew that the strike would kill the refugees in the camp, but did it anyway.
The complete disregard of Israeli authorities for the laws of war and International Humanitarian Law enacted after World War II — intended to prevent atrocities of the sort committed during that war — was manifest in remarks to the New York Times, reported Monday:
“It became evident to US officials that Israeli leaders believed mass civilian casualties were an acceptable price in the military campaign. In private conversations with American counterparts, Israeli officials referred to how the United States and other allied powers resorted to devastating bombings in Germany and Japan during World War II – including the dropping of the two atomic warheads in Hiroshima and Nagasaki – to try to defeat those countries.”………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
this claim, of killing noncombatants in self-defense, which the German officers resorted to, is precisely the claim some Israeli officials are making today, that all Palestinians in Gaza are terrorists, all are dangerous to the survival of Israel, and therefore slaughtering them en masse is permissible. These arguments were rejected by the war crimes tribunal after WW II, and they should be rejected today. Of course, extremist Israelis really mind being compared to Nazis. But there is an easy way to avoid that: don’t act like Nazis.
The flaw in the Israeli government stance is that we are not living in 1943. After World War II, the United Nations, the Geneva Conventions and other international instruments were enacted by the nations of the world to prevent the atrocities of WW II from being repeated. It was to this “rules-based international order” that the Biden administration appealed when it tried to rally the world to oppose Russian war crimes in Ukraine. In a gob-smacking act of supreme hypocrisy, the Biden administration has decided to throw the same rules-based international order on the garbage heap of special pleading when it comes to Israel.
Unfortunately, the Biden administration is letting the fascist government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu get away with mass murder. As a result, no one in the global South will ever listen to Biden or Secretary of State Antony Blinken say the words “rules-based international order” again without falling down laughing. The US attempt to cut Russia off from the world economy will now completely fail. https://scheerpost.com/2023/11/01/israel-in-search-of-its-hiroshima-massive-bomb-wipes-out-20-apt-buildings-kills-wounds-400-civilians/ #Israel #Palestine #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
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1 This Month
PLEASE OPPOSE HR 8255 AND S.3639 – bills would accelerate satellite deployment, with no environmental review or safeguards – https://ncstd5li.quorum.us/campaign/169331/
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