Iranian nuclear negotiator Sirus Naseri (shown in November 2004) yesterday dismissed claims that Iran lied about the chronology of experiments involving plutonium (AFP photo/ Robert Newald). Iran Admits Misstating Plutonium Program to IAEA By Greg Webb Global Security Newswire VIENNA — Iran has conceded that it provided incorrect information to the U.N. nuclear organization about past experiments involving plutonium, according to a statement delivered today by the organization’s top nuclear safeguards official (see GSN, June 14)...Full Story

Saudi Arabia Signs Small Quantities Protocol Saudi Arabia signed an agreement today that limits the scope of International Atomic Energy Agency inspections of the nation’s nuclear facilities, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, June 15)...Full Story

Senate Committee Backs Ignition Facility Stoppage By David Ruppe Global Security Newswire WASHINGTON — A key Senate committee voted this week to halt construction on a multibillion dollar nuclear weapons research facility, called the National Ignition Facility (see GSN, April 15, 2004)...Full Story

	Thursday, June 16, 2005

Senators Criticize Missed U.S. Security Deadlines By Chris Strohm Government Executive WASHINGTON — Two senior senators are chiding the Bush administration for missing a series of deadlines related to either reporting on or implementing efforts vital to transportation security, terrorist travel, border security and information sharing (see GSN, June 2). Senators. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) sent a letter to White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card on June 10 expressing concern that efforts related to the war on terrorism are falling behind schedule or getting off-track. Collins is chairwoman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee; Lieberman is the ranking member. “There are many challenges in simultaneously implementing these antiterrorism initiatives, but the consequences of failure are unthinkable,” the lawmakers wrote. “And, as we saw with 9/11, in the war on terrorism delay can be a form of failure. Initial stumbles in implementing new programs can be corrected, but problems often snowball if neglected.” The lawmakers pointed out that the administration has missed a number of deadlines under the 2004 Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, which was passed in response to findings from the Sept. 11 commission. According to the letter, the administration has missed deadlines related to issuing a national transportation strategy, streamlining the federal security clearance process, developing strategic plans for port security and aviation security, and reporting on several diplomatic initiatives abroad. “The legislation we enacted has the potential to substantially enhance our defenses against terrorist attacks, but only if the executive branch works with Congress to implement effectively its provisions,” the senators wrote. The lawmakers also asked the White House to reconsider a recent decision to place the program manager for the government-wide Information Sharing Environment under the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. “Because of the placement within the ODNI, the program manager is likely to face greater challenges in implementing an information sharing network that includes agencies outside the intelligence community,” the letter states. “Indeed, we question whether the ISE program manager can provide the effective leadership and government-wide management required of him under these circumstances.” The White House did not return calls for comment. Back to top

Democrats Reject GOP Compromise on Bolton Info U.S. Senate intelligence committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) yesterday attempted to pave the way for a vote on U.N. ambassador nominee John Bolton by providing portions of information requested by Democrats, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, June 14). Roberts said National Intelligence Director John Negroponte told him that seven officials identified by Foreign Relations Committee Democrats were not mentioned in National Security Agency intercepts requested by Bolton.  “He has assured me that none of them are among the names requested by Undersecretary [of State] Bolton,” Roberts said. Roberts said this information should satisfy Democrats, who had that Negroponte check for three dozen names in the communications. “This compromise represents the middle ground and should more than satisfy the concerns of my colleagues, unless, of course, they are not interested in being satisfied,” Roberts said. Senator Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) said the information provided by Roberts was not enough. “For Senator Roberts to decide on our behalf what we should be concerned about is most unusual,” Dodd said (Liz Sidoti, Associated Press/Baltimore Sun, June 15). Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) praised the compromise offered by Roberts and called for a vote on Bolton. “It is now time to move forward and give John Bolton a straight up-or-down vote to be U.N. ambassador,” Frist said in a statement. “This post has gone unfilled now for nearly five months, and at a time when pressing issues such as genocide in Darfur, Iran’s nuclear program, North Korea’s nuclear threats, and continued mismanagement and corruption at the U.N. are the stories of the day” (Senator Bill Frist release, June 15). Back to top

Iran Admits Misstating Plutonium Program to IAEA By Greg Webb Global Security Newswire VIENNA — Iran has conceded that it provided incorrect information to the U.N. nuclear organization about past experiments involving plutonium, according to a statement delivered today by the organization’s top nuclear safeguards official (see GSN, June 14). At issue was when Iran conducted experiments to separate minute amounts of plutonium from material irradiated in a Tehran facility. Plutonium is one of two materials that can be used to produce nuclear arms, though the amount extracted by Iran was far less than needed for a weapon. Recent tests of Iranian material supplied to the International Atomic Energy Agency showed that the experiments took place in both 1995 and 1998, but Iran had earlier reported that such research stopped in 1993. Pierre Goldschmidt, IAEA deputy director general for safeguards, reported the discrepancy to a quarterly meeting of the agency’s governing board. After receiving evidence of the inaccuracy, Iranian officials admitted late last month that the agency tests were correct. “Iran confirmed the agency’s understanding with regard to the chronology,” Goldschmidt told the board today, according to a text of the statement leaked to the media last night. News of the incorrect Iranian declaration drew criticism from nonproliferation experts who suspect Tehran has nuclear weapons ambitions. “They lied, they definitely lied,” Corey Hinderstein of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington told Global Security Newswire yesterday, dismissing the possibility that Iran had unintentionally misstated the information in earlier declarations. She speculated that Iran had wished to conceal the extent of its interest in producing plutonium. Iranian officials have dismissed such allegations as groundless and belittled Goldschmidt’s statement. “What difference would it make for us to say these tests were made 13 years ago or 10 years ago?” senior Iranian nuclear negotiator Sirus Naseri told the New York Times. “It would make no difference at all, so there cannot be any motive of concealment.” “I’m sorry, it’s not a big story,” he said. Iran has persistently argued that its nuclear activities are strictly peaceful, intended only to create a nuclear power industry. However, plutonium is used far less commonly for nuclear energy than uranium, both of which can be used to construct nuclear weapons. Iranian officials have told that agency that the plutonium separation — also known as “reprocessing” — experiments “were carried out to learn about the nuclear fuel cycle, and to gain experience in reprocessing chemistry,” according to a November report to the board from agency Director General Mohamed ElBaradei. That explanation had little credibility with another U.S. critic of Iran’s nuclear program. “Some countries have considered recycling plutonium as a fuel for nuclear energy,” said Robert Einhorn, a former senior State Department nonproliferation official who is now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “But that’s not why the Iranians are doing it. Presumably they’re looking into extracting plutonium for producing nuclear weapons.” Einhorn has repeatedly cautioned in recent months that Iran might continue to have a clandestine network of nuclear facilities despite its public announcements of transparency. U.S. officials here described Goldschmidt’s statement as a wide-ranging indictment of Iran’s nuclear intentions and reiterated calls for Iran to completely end its atomic activities. Iran must dismantle all of its nuclear fuel cycle activities, U.S. Ambassador Jackie Sanders told the board today, including “at a minimum, all uranium conversion, all uranium enrichment, all heavy water reactor-related activities and any plutonium reprocessing activities.” Goldschmidt’s statement also criticized Iran for failing to provide clarifying   information for other parts of the agency’s investigation of the nation’s nuclear program. In particular, he said the agency needed more data to understand the history of Iran’s effort to build more advanced uranium enrichment centrifuges.  Iran has told the agency that it did no work on the so-called P-2 centrifuges before 2002, but Goldschmidt told the board that Tehran has not provided “sufficient assurance that no related activities were carried during that period.” In addition, the agency has had difficulty understanding when Iran first received more basic centrifuges, called P-1s, from an illicit nuclear smuggling network once headed by Pakistan’s top nuclear scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan. A chronology offered recently by Iran was “not consistent with earlier information,” Goldschmidt said, and “no positive reply has been received thus far” to agency requests for additional detail. Taken together, Goldschmidt’s concerns were “another indication that it’s way too premature to assume that Iran has come back into compliance with its safeguards obligations,” Einhorn said. “This fits a pattern in which Iran is forced to admit to something it tried to conceal and then says, ‘That’s all of it,’ until more information is detected,” he said. “Iran must do more to come clean, but doesn’t seem to have done that,” he added. Back to top       Saudi Arabia Signs Small Quantities Protocol Saudi Arabia signed an agreement today that limits the scope of International Atomic Energy Agency inspections of the nation’s nuclear facilities, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, June 15). The United States, European Union and Australia had opposed Saudi Arabia adopting the Small Quantities Protocol, a 1971 agreement that limits inspections in countries with small nuclear programs. The protocol allows Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty member states to forgo reporting possession of up to 10 tons of natural uranium and 2.2 pounds of plutonium.  The rule also allows new nuclear facilities to be kept secret until six months prior to operation. Ten tons of natural uranium can be converted into highly enriched uranium for one nuclear weapon, according to AFP. One Western diplomat said the board did not consider Saudi Arabia to be a nuclear proliferation threat. “The problem regarding the SQP is philosophical and is no way related to any concerns regarding Saudi nuclear activities,” the diplomat told reporters here today (Greg Webb, Global Security Newswire, June 16). Delegates at the IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna were debating today whether to keep the protocol in effect, although no action is expected to be taken on the agreement at this board session (Agence France-Presse, June 16). Back to top       Senate Committee Backs Ignition Facility Stoppage By David Ruppe Global Security Newswire WASHINGTON — A key Senate committee voted this week to halt construction on a multibillion dollar nuclear weapons research facility, called the National Ignition Facility (see GSN, April 15, 2004). The Senate Appropriations Energy and Water Subcommittee approved $314 million for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory facility in California for fiscal 2006, $146 million less than requested by the administration, which would allow the continuation of experiments using elements of the facility already built. However, “No funds are provided to continue construction,” the committee said Tuesday in a press release on the Energy and Water Development Appropriations bill. The planned Rose Bowl-size facility is intended to demonstrate by 2010 unprecedented nuclear fusion ignition through the simultaneous concentration of 192 laser beams. It also could help keep aging U.S. nuclear weapons safe and reliable, and be used for nuclear energy, astrophysics, and other scientific research, according to the Energy Department. Construction has experienced delays attributed to management problems.  At an April hearing, subcommittee Chairman Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) called it a “monster program in terms of dollars” and said the administration’s fiscal 2006 budget “cuts a lot of relevant [nuclear stockpile] stewardship research while [the National Nuclear Security Administration] wages this — what I consider almost a crusade to move on with NIF.” At a hearing last year, he vowed to “do everything in my power to ensure that program managers deal with most pressing technical issues before we allow the program to continue.” He then questioned whether the department was constructing elements of the facility well in advance of what is necessary to make it difficult for Congress to kill the program. “As the chairman of this committee, I don’t like to get hoodwinked and I don’t like the way the laboratory which will house NIF has proceeded to spend the money, buy all the parts and everything that goes in it ahead of time and have them all there,” he said. The House Appropriations Energy and Water Subcommittee this year excused the delays and voted to fund in full the administration’s $142 million request for construction. “The committee supports the department’s response to the congressional concern expressed last year regarding the fiscal year 2005 budget request proposed schedule [delay] to the program goal of ignition demonstration in 2010 for the National Ignition Facility (NIF). The committee continues to view ignition demonstration as the primary benchmark for success in this program,” it said in a report. A report by the Natural Resources Defense Council in June 2000 questioned the scientific and technical basis of attempting fusion ignition and whether the program would help much in maintaining the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile. “This project should never have gone forward,” the report’s author, Christopher Paine, said in an interview today. The University of California’s attitude should have been, he said, “It may be a great idea, but [it] needed a lot more work before taking it to the construction stage.” Work on the facility began in the late 1990s. The Government Accountability Office has estimated it will cost as much as $4 billion to build an ignition-ready facility. NNSA chief Linton Brooks told the Senate subcommittee at the April hearing that the facility “continues to be an essential component of the Stockpile Stewardship Program.” To meet the goal of fully commissioning 192 laser beams and fusion ignition by 2010, however, he said the agency has “had to accept additional risks and reduce some other inertial confinement fusion work at other sites.” Paine said he does not believe Domenici intends this year to see construction halted, but rather hopes to “take the program hostage” in order to increase his bargaining leverage in conference for programs that are important to him. The bill is scheduled to be considered by the full Senate Appropriations Committee today. Back to top       IAEA Inspectors to Seek Missing Nuclear Materials in Former Soviet Republic of Georgia The International Atomic Energy Agency is sending inspectors to the former Soviet republic of Georgia within the next few weeks in hopes of locating weapon-grade nuclear materials that might have gone missing, Reuters reported yesterday (see GSN, May 31). “There will be a trip to Georgia with senior safeguards inspectors,” said agency spokeswoman Melissa Fleming. “It will be the first meeting with the new government and will focus on implementation of safeguards and the Additional Protocol in all of Georgia,” she said. The agency is also attempting to arrange a visit to Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia region, according to diplomats close to the agency. Georgian scientists abandoned an atomic physics institute in the Abkhazian capital of Sukhumi in 1993 after insurgents took the city. Nuclear materials at the facility — including weapon-grade plutonium and highly enriched uranium — seemingly disappeared, according to Reuters. One U.N. diplomat said “about 9 kilograms of plutonium” may be missing. “The Russians did an inspection at Sukhumi and found traces of plutonium there,” the diplomat said. David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, said the situation was troublesome. “Nine kilos of plutonium is enough for two nuclear weapons. I don’t understand why there’s not more concern. This should be investigated,” he said. Concerns also exist regarding the trafficking of radioactive material in Abkhazia that could be used in a radiological “dirty bomb,” according to Reuters (Louis Charbonneau, Reuters/AlertNet, June 15). Back to top       Inspections at Iranian Military Sites Unlikely to Be Allowed Soon, Senior Official Indicates A senior Iranian official indicated yesterday that Tehran would not allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect two military facilities some suspect may be the sites of secret nuclear work, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, June 15). Iran has refused to allow a follow-up visit to Parchin, according to AFP (see GSN, Feb. 7). In January, inspectors were granted access to only five buildings at the sprawling site. Tehran has also refused to answer agency questions about dual-use material and equipment at the Lavizan site, now completely razed, IAEA Deputy Director General Pierre Goldschmidt said in March. Inspections of the two military sites would be “transparency” visits, beyond the scope of the oversight required under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Iranian senior nuclear negotiator Sirus Naseri yesterday told AFP. Iran has “an open mind to come to an agreement on modalities” for these visits but “first things come first” and “other issues have to be made clear,” Naseri said, referring to issues such as uranium contamination on imported equipment in Iran (see GSN, June 10). “These transparency issues need confidentiality,” Naseri said. Naseri added that the agency’s investigation was “coming to an end anyway” and was “just down to a few nitty-grittys.” “We think the whole thing could have been over long ago,” he said. He added, however, that the “agency has been prudent. This is an approach we understand.  So we want to come to a fair conclusion” (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, June 15). Back to top       Russia to Scrap Missile Trains by End of the Year Russia plans to decommission all its nuclear missile trains by the end of the year, RIA Novosti reported yesterday (see GSN, Jan. 31). “Unfortunately missiles grow old, just like people, and their guaranteed service life runs out. It is precisely because the missiles’ guaranteed service life has run out and cannot be extended (since series production was in Ukraine) that the removal from combat duty and scrapping of missile trains has been going on since 2001,” sources said. “New systems of the Topol-M [missile] type, built in Russia, will replace the missile trains,” said Col.-Gen. Nikolay Solovtsov, commander in chief of the Strategic Missile Troops (RIA Novosti/BBC Monitoring, June 15). Back to top       U.S. Hopes South Korean Delegation Can Persuade Pyongyang to Resume Nuclear Talks U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill expressed hope today that a South Korean delegation in North Korea for commemorations of a historic summit between the two countries will aid efforts to persuade Pyongyang to resume multilateral negotiations on its nuclear program, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, June 15). “At least now I know South Korea is having some contacts with the North Koreans so I’m looking forward to hearing what’s going on,” said Hill, who is in Seoul for meetings on the nuclear issue. Hill reiterated that the United States had no deadline for a new round of six-party talks, which also include China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. “While time is not on our side, it is definitely not on (North Korea’s) side either,” Hill added. “It’s in everyone's interest that we get this process going” (Ji-Soo Kim, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, June 16). North Korea, meanwhile, today complained that Washington continues to conduct a “hostile” policy toward Pyongyang, Agence France-Presse reported. Leaders in the communist nation have declared that such a policy is keeping them from returning to the talks. “The U.S. hostile policy against our republic has not changed at all,” Kim Yong Nam, No. 1 leader in Pyongyang, was quoted as saying. “(The United States) puts pressure on us in various sectors such as politics, economics and military. But we are unfazed and stepping up economic construction,” Kim said (Agence France-Presse/SpaceWar.com, June 16). Back to top

Ricin Vaccine Shows Early Promise The first ricin vaccine to be tested in humans is developing antibodies in early clinical trials that counter the affects of exposure to the toxin, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, June 8). Dor BioPharma’s RiVax vaccine was given to five volunteers. Participants who received either 10 or 33 micrograms began developing antibodies; evaluation is continuing of data on volunteers who received 100 micrograms of the vaccine. Exposure to just 500 micrograms of ricin can be fatal for adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ricin also causes lung damage, fever, nausea, and abdominal pain, AP reported. Data from the RiVax trial are expected to be released in the coming months (Associated Press/Yahoo News, June 15).  Back to top

New Sarin Leaks Discovered at Blue Grass Army Depot A routine check of sarin-filled M55 rockets Tuesday at the Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky uncovered two more leaking munitions, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, May 31). Depot personnel sealed three leaking rockets last month in the same storage igloo. “We knew that we had not found them all,” Wiley Flynn, a depot chemical expert, said in a statement. Army officials said the leaks posed no danger to the public, and the storage igloo would continue to be monitored. Blue Grass stores 51,000 M55 rockets, each designed to contain 10 pounds of sarin. The rockets are housed in 45 buried storage igloos (Associated Press/WKYT, June 15). The head of a U.S. chemical weapons watchdog group said leaks have not increased at Blue Grass despite the age of the rockets, which were manufactured in the 1960s, the Louisville Courier-Journal reported today. “That’s not to say that couldn’t change,” said Craig Williams, director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group. The leaks illustrate “the need for expedient and safe disposal of this stockpile because it is the only way to eliminate any potential risks associated with these weapons of mass destruction stored here in Kentucky,” Williams said. Kentucky’s Republican Senators Jim Bunning and Mitch McConnell agreed. “This just emphasizes the need to get these chemical weapons cleaned up as soon as possible,” Bunning said in a prepared statement. “The longer these toxins are stored, the more unstable they become and greater potential for harm they pose for Kentuckians,” added McConnell (James Carroll, Courier-Journal, June 16). Back to top       Jordanian Plot Suspects had Chemical Explosives An expert with the Jordanian General Intelligence Department testified that materials taken from defendants accused of plotting a chemical attack against the agency were capable of producing a “chemical cloud,” the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, May 31). Col. Najeh al-Azam, testifying in the trial of 13 people accused of planning a series of attacks in Jordan, said the explosives seized when the defendants were arrested had “very high sensitivity” and could have caused large numbers of casualties if detonated. Materials seized from the suspects “could be used in manufacturing chemical weapons,” al-Azam said. Chief suspect Azmi al-Jayousi, in his confession, also indicated steps for manufacturing explosives, AP reported. “An experiment was carried out in the desert in the presence of the Military Prosecutor Lt. Col. Mahmoud Obeidat where a cloud was formed which could have caused burns, paralysis of the breathing system and suffocation,” al-Azam said. “So the steps mentioned in al-Jayousi’s confession were right 100 percent” (Associated Press, June 15).                   Back to top

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