National Council of Resistance of Iran official Mohammad Mohaddessin briefs reporters yesterday on the council’s accusation that Iran is secretly testing advanced uranium centrifuges (Fred Dufour/Getty Images). Iran Seeks Details in Response to Nuclear Proposal Tehran is seeking more specific details and assurances about the Western powers’ proposal to resolve the Iranian nuclear crisis, said two experts who have apparently seen Iran’s formal response to the offer (see GSN, Aug. 23). The response, delivered this week, contains about 100 questions and requests for clarification, the London Guardian reported (Ian Traynor, The  Guardian, Aug. 25)...Full Story

HHS Moves Slowly on Radiation Treatments By Zack Phillips, Government Executive WASHINGTON — First it was Iran.  Then it was North Korea.  On the international stage, the debate rages over what to do about nuclear weapons.  Here at home, argument also dominates discussion of U.S. preparedness for a nuclear strike (see GSN, Aug. 21)...Full Story

Activity Seen at Possible D.P.R.K. Nuclear Test Site Activity seen recently at a suspected North Korean nuclear test site has led Japan to increase monitoring of the Stalinist nation, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Aug. 24)...Full Story

	Friday, August 25, 2006

Charge Filed Against 12th Airline Bomb Plot Suspect British authorities yesterday charged a 12th suspect in connection with the foiled plot to detonate liquid explosives on passenger airliners flying from the United Kingdom to the United States, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Aug. 22). Umair Hussain, 24, is charged with failing to disclose information about a possible terrorist plot, according to London Metropolitan Police. Defense attorney Timur Rustem expressed surprised at the charge. “I personally think this has been done not for a legal reason but for a tactical reason,” he said. Eight suspects were charged earlier this week with conspiracy to murder and preparing to commit acts of terrorism.  Authorities filed lesser charges against three other suspects.  Another eight remain in custody but have not yet been charged. Hussain and his brother Mehran Hussain, 24, are accused of failing to disclose information about a third brother, Nabeel Hussain, 22, AP reported.  Nabeel Hussain is apparently among those who are presently jailed without charges (David Stringer, Associated Press, Aug. 25). Back to top

Iran Seeks Details in Response to Nuclear Proposal Tehran is seeking more specific details and assurances about the Western powers’ proposal to resolve the Iranian nuclear crisis, said two experts who have apparently seen Iran’s formal response to the offer (see GSN, Aug. 23). The response, delivered this week, contains about 100 questions and requests for clarification, the London Guardian reported (Ian Traynor, The  Guardian, Aug. 25). Some of those issues were described in an online commentary by Abbas Maleki, director of the International Institute for Caspian Studies in Tehran and a senior research fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, and Kaveh Afrasiabi, a political scientist and author of a book on Iran’s nuclear program. According to the two experts, Iran is seeking: —specific assurances that it has the right to develop nuclear energy; —firm guarantees that it could purchase light-water nuclear power reactors; —assurances that it would receive supplies of nuclear fuel; —clarification over U.S. willingness to lift economic sanctions; —details of a regional security arrangement referred to in the original proposal; and —a specific timeline for delivery of incentives. The experts argue that Tehran’s response represents a victory for moderates in the Iranian government who prevailed against hard-liners who do not wish to see any negotiations with Western nations. “Should the United States and its U.N. envoy, John Bolton, decide to ignore this opportunity and push for U.N. sanctions against Iran, despite the positive dimensions of Iran’s offer, the stage will be set for a full-scale international crisis (Maleki/Afrasiabi, AgenceGlobal.com, Aug. 23). Despite an apparent willingness to talk, Iran did not agree to the U.N. Security Council’s demand to suspend uranium enrichment and other sensitive nuclear activities by Aug 31.  The incentives proposal to which Iran responded this week was issued by the five permanent Security Council members — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States — and Germany. The United States and Germany appear ready to push for imposing economic sanctions against Iran, the Associated Press reported today.  Iran’s refusal to freeze its nuclear program would eventually lead China and Russia to support such a move, said one senior diplomat who had been briefed on Iran’s response (George Jahn, Associated Press I/Boston Globe, Aug 24). Russia, however, appeared to reject the idea of sanctions any time soon. “I know of no instances in world practice and previous experience in which sanctions have achieved their aim and proved effective,” Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said today.  “Moreover, I believe that the question is not so serious at the moment for the U.N. Security Council or the group of six to consider any introduction of sanctions,” he added.  “Russia stands for further political and diplomatic efforts to settle the issue” (Ron Popeski, Reuters, Aug. 25). The Western nations of the six-party group had planned to meet in New York this week, but delayed the session to allow more time to study Iran’s response (Xinhua News Agency, Aug. 24). In any case, U.S. officials said they would wait for the Security Council-established  Aug. 31 deadline for Iran to suspend its nuclear program before taking any formal action. “Once we get there, we’ll begin to take action,” State Department spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos said yesterday (Anne Gearan, Associated Press II/Forbes.com, Aug. 25). Centrifuge Testing Meanwhile, an Iranian dissident group has accused Tehran of building and testing advanced uranium enrichment centrifuges (see GSN, March 21).  The National Council of Resistance of Iran asserted that Iran has assembled at least 15 P-2 centrifuges, a more-advanced version of a type Iran has acknowledged using.  Such equipment could enrich uranium more efficiently, whether to produce nuclear fuel for power plants or material for weapons. Council spokesman Mohammad Mohaddessin said Iran was conducting the work at a secret facility near Tehran (Agence France-Presse, Aug. 24). Back to top       Activity Seen at Possible D.P.R.K. Nuclear Test Site Activity seen recently at a suspected North Korean nuclear test site has led Japan to increase monitoring of the Stalinist nation, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Aug. 24). Vehicles have been seen entering and exiting the area, a Japanese government official told Kyodo News.  Tokyo cannot say whether the movement indicates an imminent nuclear test by Pyongyang, the official said. ABC News reported last week that U.S. officials believed North Korea might be planning a test detonation of a nuclear weapon (see GSN, Aug. 18; Kozo Mizoguchi, Associated Press I/ABC News, Aug. 25). “If North Korea carries out a nuclear test it would be a grave threat to the peace and stability of our country, Northeast Asia and the international community,” Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said today.  “We can never accept that.” South Korea is prepared to take action against North Korea should it carry out the test, Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon said today.  He did not elaborate on what form that action might take, according to Agence France-Presse. “The government is reviewing and will review measures befitting such an incident,” Ban said. “If North Korea carries out nuclear testing, it would bring about much more grave consequences than its missile launch in July,” he said (see GSN, July 5).  “It would create a very serious situation, shaking the global nonproliferation regime to its foundation” (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, Aug. 25). South Korean Defense Minister Yoon Kwang-ung said today that North Korea is believed to have one or two nuclear weapons, AP reported.  Seoul has previously publicly assessed Pyongyang only as having the capability to produce that many weapons. Experts have made the case for North Korea possessing sufficient nuclear material for six or more weapons, AP reported (Associated Press II/Pravda, Aug. 25). Back to top       Japan Arrests Five for Illegal Equipment Exports Tokyo police have arrested five executives and employees of a Japanese precision equipment manufacturing firm on suspicion of illegally exporting machinery that could be used to produce nuclear weapons, officials announced today (see GSN, Feb. 13). Kazusaku Tezuka, president of Mitutoyo Corp., joined four other company staffers under arrest after authorities found evidence that the firm in 2001 improperly shipped two three-dimensional measuring devices to a subsidiary in Malaysia.  The firm was also discovered to have illegally shipped similar equipment to Japanese firms in Thailand and China the same year, Kyodo News reported. Three-dimensional measuring machines can map cylindrical shapes with great accuracy and cannot be exported without government approval, according to officials from the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry.  The machines can help to produce centrifuges used to enrich uranium, said ministry official Hiroyuki Murakami. Mitutoyo equipment was reportedly found in Libya after that nation revealed a long-time nuclear-weapon program and helped to uncover the international nuclear smuggling network led by former top Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, according to the Associated Press.  The Khan network used a Malaysian firm that was found to have purchased equipment from Mitutoyo, Kyodo News reported (Carl Freire, Associated Press/Washington Post, Aug. 25). Back to top       Germany Confirms Submarine Sale to Israel German officials confirmed today that Berlin plans to sell Israel two submarines, but denied earlier reports that they could be equipped with nuclear weapons (see GSN, Aug. 23). “They are not designed to carry nuclear weapons,” deputy government spokesman Thomas Steg said today (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, Aug. 25). Private analysts, however, suggested that Israel was seeking to diversify its nuclear weapon deployments to ensure that it would be able to retaliate during a nuclear conflict.  Israel has repeatedly expressed concern over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Dolphin-class submarines would provide Israel with a way to prevent an enemy from destroying Israeli nuclear weapons in a first strike, according to one analyst. “They are very well-built, very well-prepared, lots of interesting equipment, one of the best conventional [non-nuclear powered] submarines available,” said independent defense analyst Paul Beaver. “We are talking about a third string of deterrence capabilities,” he added, referring to the conventional wisdom that Israel can already deliver nuclear weapons by ballistic missiles and aircraft. “Planes are vulnerable, unlike nuclear (armed) submarines that can operate for an almost unlimited amount of time without being struck,” said Michael Karpin, another independent expert.  “Second-strike capabilities are a crucial element in any nuclear conflict.” “The Iranians would be very foolish if they attacked Israel,” Beaver said. Meanwhile, German political opposition parties have criticized the deal. Germany should not have agreed to the sale without receiving a promise that Israel would never arm the submarines with nuclear weapons, said Green Party spokesman Winfried Nachtwei. “This red line should not be crossed,” Nachtwei said.  “Otherwise it is a complete renunciation of Germany’s policy of nonproliferation” (Ramit Plushnick-Masti, Associated Press/Monterey Herald, Aug. 25). Back to top

Mailed Powder Confirmed as Corn Starch Laboratory tests have determined that a white powder found in a mass mailing was corn starch, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, Aug. 24). The Pennsylvania Health Department had advised hospitals and other health agencies not to open the mailings after an initial test on one sample showed a slight positive for botulinum toxin.  Subsequent tests came up negative. The Health Department injected the corn starch into a mouse as a final test for any toxins, said spokesman Richard McGarvey.  Tainted powder would be expected to kill the mouse within 24 hours. “We’re still in the process of doing it, but the mouse hasn’t died,” he said yesterday.  “Our mouse is still running around.” Bulk mailer Positive Promotions this week posted roughly 4,000 mailings to hospitals, home health agencies and hospice organizations in Ohio, New York and Pennsylvania. Prior to the 2001 anthrax attacks, mailing firms regularly used corn starch to help ease sticky materials into envelopes, said Bill Vignola, president of Mailman Inc., the company that assembled the mailing.  While the practice has largely been discontinued, an employee at Mailman Inc. used corn starch to separate some plastic booklets that had become stuck to one another.  A couple envelopes ended up with more powder than would be expected in such a circumstance, Vignola said. “It’s created a furor that you cannot imagine,” he said.  “Anyway, we got to the bottom of it and satisfied the postal inspectors and our customer and, hopefully, it’s been put to sleep” (Associated Press/phillyBurbs.com, Aug. 25). Back to top

DOD Panel Recommends $1.5B for Blue Grass, Pueblo A U.S. Defense Department board this week recommended spending $1.5 billion over five years for chemical weapons disposal at the Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky and the Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado (see GSN, July 19). The Defense Acquisition Board plan would distribute $300 million annually to both sites, The Pueblo Chieftain reported.  Preliminary construction of weapons neutralization facilities is under way at the storage depots. “Just 18 months ago, the Chemical Weapons Working Group learned that the undersecretary of defense for acquisition, who is the decision maker on this program, had plugged in a mere $30 million per year until 2010, and placed both sites on a ‘care-taker’ status,” the organization said in a prepared statement.  “This action, had it been carried out, would have caused activities at both sites to come to a halt and pushed the completion date for disposal out well past 2020.” “It appears that the efforts at the local and state levels and on Capitol Hill have translated into action at the Pentagon,” the release states.  “Apparently they have heard our arguments and taken heed.” The Pentagon’s Assembled Chemical Weapons Alternative program had hoped for higher levels of funding, John Klomp, chairman of the Colorado Chemical Demilitarization Citizens Advisory Commission, told the Chieftain. “This will probably be a slower approach, putting us three years beyond what we thought we would have for construction and hiring,” he said.  “I’m happy that it looks like we now have a steady funding cycle,” Klomp added.  “I wish it could have been a more aggressive cycle” (John Norton, The Pueblo Chieftain, Aug. 25). Back to top       U.S. Army Finishes Delaware CW Disposal Project The U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency on Wednesday finished destroying six World War I-era shells found this year at a Delaware seafood processing plant (see GSN, Aug. 16). The agency’s Nonstockpile Chemical Materiel Project used the mobile Explosive Destruction System to eliminate the 75 mm shells containing mustard agent. The system has now been used on four occasions in Delaware, and has also been deployed to Colorado, Maryland, Utah and Washington, D.C. (U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency release, Aug. 23). Back to top

U.S. Cruiser to Boost Pacific-Based Missile Defenses A senior Japanese official yesterday lauded the pending arrival of a U.S. Navy ship equipped with air- and missile-defense systems.  The USS Shiloh is due to begin its deployment Tuesday at the Yokosuka naval base (see GSN, July 10). Japanese Vice Defense Minister Takemasa Moriya welcomed the cruiser armed with Standard Missile 3 interceptors, and said the United States would deploy six such Aegis-class vessels in the Pacific this year (see GSN, Aug. 23; Jiji Press Ticker, Aug. 24). Back to top

HHS Moves Slowly on Radiation Treatments By Zack Phillips, Government Executive WASHINGTON — First it was Iran.  Then it was North Korea.  On the international stage, the debate rages over what to do about nuclear weapons.  Here at home, argument also dominates discussion of U.S. preparedness for a nuclear strike (see GSN, Aug. 21). The Health and Human Services Department is negotiating to buy drugs to treat radiation sickness, the ailment facing those affected by the fallout from a nuclear detonation, according to two drug manufacturers.  But that program has been beset by delays and questions, eliciting complaints from industry and ire from Capitol Hill. “I remain extremely concerned about the nation's preparedness for a nuclear event on United States soil,” wrote Representative Tom Davis (R-Va.), chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, in a May 22 letter to HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt.  “As you know, I have repeatedly asked your department to provide the committee with updates regarding the (radiation treatment) procurement.” Davis spokesman Rob White said in July that the committee had not received an answer, “nor been told when we might expect one.” The detonation of a 10-kiloton improvised nuclear device near a major metropolitan center is the first catastrophic scenario in a 2005 planning document prepared by the Homeland Security Department for federal, state and local preparedness activities.  It predicts hundreds of thousands of casualties.  A 2004 report in the Annals of Internal Medicine concluded setting off such a device near a city of 2 million people would kill more than 13,000 immediately, and fallout would leave more than 300,000 others in need of medical care. For those not killed immediately, the high doses of radiation can cause a collection of illnesses known by the umbrella term radiation sickness, or more formally, acute radiation syndrome.  Among the most serious results are the loss of infection-fighting white blood cells, oxygen-carrying red blood cells and blood-clotting platelets; without enough of these cells, victims are left vulnerable to infection, anemia or bleeding to death. Hollis-Eden Pharmaceuticals of San Diego and Novelos Therapeutics of Newton, Mass., announced in June the drugs they are developing to treat ARS had been judged by Health and Human Services as “within competitive range” for further discussion, a determination that formally begins the procurement process.  The products would be injected subcutaneously, so victims could self-administer them much as diabetics take insulin. But the road to procuring a countermeasure to ARS has been a long one.  HHS first solicited such a drug from industry in an October 2004 request for information.  Then came a draft version of the request for proposals — initially promised in July 2005, then pushed back to September 2005.  The department released the final solicitation in December 2005, and the contract award, originally slated for June, now is promised for September, according to Hollis-Eden and Novelos.  HHS officials have not acknowledged the negotiations or spoken publicly about when the award will occur. “It's safe to say we have concerns about the speed and attention HHS is giving to this important matter,” says Davis spokesman White. Davis and others have asked why HHS’ solicitation asks for up to 100,000 doses of the ARS countermeasure, with the potential for an additional 100,000 doses later, when a nuclear attack in a major U.S. city likely would affect far more than 200,000 people.  By comparison, HHS bought 1.7 million pediatric doses of a drug to prevent the thyroid gland from absorbing too much radioactive iodine and 400,000 doses of two agents that can help expel certain kinds of non-nuclear radiation from the body.  Those drugs would not treat radiation sickness. “A hundred thousand doses is not nearly enough,” Lee Hamilton, vice chairman of the 9/11 commission, told 60 Minutes in January.  “If you really had a major attack, you probably would need much more than that.  One estimate we made was that we’d need 10 million doses.” And industry representatives say the 100,000 figure is harmful because it discourages investment in drugs to treat radiation victims.  The point of Project Bioshield, the $5.6 billion federal biodefense program that will fund the procurement, is to establish the market for certain countermeasures so that investors, seeing the potential reward, will fund the costly and risky drug development. “They're saying to the world ‘There is no market for development of any radiation protector,’” says one researcher in the field, who asked not to be named to avoid souring relations with the department.  “Unless you're making Rolls-Royces, what are you going to sell 100,000 doses of and make it commercial?” Last fall, HHS itself funded $47 million in grants and contracts for research on countermeasures to radiological and nuclear threats, through the National Institutes of Health.  But some in the scientific community say the program excludes many experts in nuclear radiation and its research is more relevant to cancer patients, who could receive higher levels of cancer-fighting therapy if the harmful effects of radiation were reduced.  Most universities and institutes tapped to become the Centers for Medical Countermeasures Against Radiation under the NIH program are radiation oncology programs. Scott Miller, chief of the University of Utah’s division of radiobiology, says the NIH-funded research is “fantastic” for radiation oncology, but does not deal with the components of nuclear fuel or a nuclear warhead.  “The programs selected for CMCR funding have most of their experience in the sterile environment of radiation oncology programs in hospitals where only certain types of radiation are used and under very controlled situations,” Miller says via e-mail.  “Additionally, some of the products that are being developed are only effective given prior to radiation exposure.  This is wonderful in a hospital setting, but not very practical in a radiological attack.” The Hollis-Eden and Novelos products would be given after an attack.  Both companies are pleased that HHS might buy some. “We truly believe if we get validated and win this award, the technology gets validated and we can expand into a much bigger number — either in the private sector or in the government itself,” says Hollis-Eden senior vice president Robert Marsella.   Back to top

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