IAEA safeguards head Olli Heinonen (left) attends a meeting with Iranian nuclear officials today in Tehran (Getty Images). Iran, IAEA Begin Nuclear Talks International nuclear officials began two day of talks with Iran today to seek agreement on an “action plan” to alleviate concerns over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, Reuters reported (see GSN, July 10). While International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards chief Olli Heinonen, met with officials in Tehran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reaffirmed his intention to defy a U.N. Security Council demand to freeze the nation’s nuclear activities...Full Story

Nuclear Inspectors Could Enter North Korea in Days Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency could enter North Korea on Saturday to oversee the halt of operations at the plutonium-producing Yongbyon nuclear facility, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, July 10)...Full Story

Bush Boosts Biodefense Budget Request The Bush administration’s fiscal 2008 budget request would provide $309 million more for civilian biodefense than its previous request, boosting funding for the Health and Human Services, Defense and Agriculture departments, the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Biosecurity said Monday (see GSN, June 11)...Full Story

	Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Iran, IAEA Begin Nuclear Talks International nuclear officials began two day of talks with Iran today to seek agreement on an “action plan” to alleviate concerns over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, Reuters reported (see GSN, July 10). While International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards chief Olli Heinonen, met with officials in Tehran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reaffirmed his intention to defy a U.N. Security Council demand to freeze the nation’s nuclear activities. “The process of the installment [of uranium enrichment centrifuges] might slow down or speed up ... but no one should expect us to give up our rights and stop its process,” he said (Reuters I, July 11). Still, agency head Mohamed ElBaradei expressed hope yesterday that Iran’s willingness to hold discussions could signal a step back from the brinkmanship Tehran and Western nations have displayed in past four years. “I hope (Heinonen) can come back with at least a serious indication from Iran to move forward.  To resolve these issues would be a major breakthrough," he said Monday at the agency’s Vienna headquarters. ElBaradei disclosed this week that Iran has slowed the pace of installing centrifuges at its uranium enrichment facility at Natanz.  He suggested that the move might encourage the United States and West European powers to refrain from seeking a new round of Security Council sanctions against Iran, according to Reuters. A U.S. official, however, played down the significance of the slowdown. “I would not necessarily read too much into that (enrichment slowdown) and whether or not that is a conscious political decision or an issue of technical problems,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Monday. One former State Department nonproliferation official also expressed skepticism over Iran’s intentions. “Iran's offer is more likely stalling for time before further sanctions,” said Mark Fitzpatrick, now with the International Institute for Strategic Studies.  “Then, as now, their willingness to provide answers depended on having the issue taken off the Security Council agenda” (Mark Heinrich, Reuters II, July 10). Meanwhile, U.S. officials are crafting a new set of sanctions to propose to the Security Council, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The council has twice imposed sanctions since December, and the deadline set for an Iranian nuclear freeze passed in May. The next batch of measures should escalate pressure significantly, a senior U.S. official said. “This package has to be more than incrementally tougher,” the official said.  “Either that, or Iran has to show that it is truly willing to change its course.” The new measures under consideration include freezing the assets of a second major Iranian bank, the Journal reported.  In its second round of sanctions, the council agreed to target Bank Sepah, the nation’s fourth largest financial institution.  In addition, officials are discussing whether to target an engineering company owned by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps.  The firm contracts with private companies in the oil and gas industry, according to the Journal. Also under consideration is a ban on the international travel of a select group of Iranian officials.  Such a ban was debated earlier this year, but was ultimately dropped from the council’s sanctions. While the United States seeks agreements with its Western allies for the new measures, China and Russia have publicly expressed concern about imposing further sanctions against Iran, the Journal reported. China has rapidly growing economic interests with Iran, importing about $5 billion in goods in the 12 months ending in March, while exporting more than $5 billion over the same period.  Iran is the now the third largest oil supplier to China, the Journal reported (Neil King, Wall Street Journal, July 11). Back to top       Nuclear Inspectors Could Enter North Korea in Days Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency could enter North Korea on Saturday to oversee the halt of operations at the plutonium-producing Yongbyon nuclear facility, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, July 10). Pyongyang ejected agency personnel in 2002 and announced its withdrawal from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty after the United States accused the Stalinist regime of operating a secret uranium enrichment program.  Following years of negotiations, North Korea agreed in February to allow inspectors to monitor the reactor shutdown under an agreement intended to result in the dismantlement of its nuclear weapons program. IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said he did not know whether North Korea would wait until inspectors arrive to close the facility. “We will verify that they have shut it.  Whether they shut it before or not, that is immaterial,” he said today in Seoul (Jae-Soon Chang, Associated Press I/Yahoo!News, July 11). “Now is a very crucial time for the IAEA, Korea and the entire world.  North Korea has just returned to a verification process.  I wish it would lead to North Korea’s return to the NPT and complete scrapping of its nuclear weapons program,” ElBaradei added, according to the Yonhap News Agency. “This is a very complicated and difficult process and can’t be resolved overnight.  We need patience,” he said (Yoo Cheong-mo, Yonhap News Agency, July 11). Meanwhile, the United States confirmed July 18 as the anticipated date for the resumption of the six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear program, AP reported. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, lead U.S. negotiator on the issue, is traveling to Japan and South Korea on his way to the negotiations in China, said State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey. “We expect a six-party meeting on the 18th or thereabouts,” Casey said. “I can’t predict for you or give you a real read on what these six envoys are going to determine, what progress they will actually make or not and what might end up on the agenda for the” meeting of foreign ministers from the six nations,” Casey said.  “But the point is for them to move forward with this” (Associated Press II/New York Times, July 10). A permanent solution to North Korea’s nuclear program could be promoted by lifting sanctions imposed on Pyongyang following its 2006 nuclear test blast, China’s ambassador to the United Nations said yesterday. The “main parties” that submitted the sanctions resolution to the United Nations would need to call for its removal, said Ambassador Wang Guangya. The United States was the lead sponsor for the resolution, AP reported.  “We had a previously scheduled review of the sanctions and there is no plan for any change,” said U.S. spokesman Richard Grenell. The sanctions banned North Korea imports or exports of WMD or ballistic missile material, and for a freeze on assets of individuals and companies connected to Pyongyang’s programs in those sectors.  The resolution also required U.N. nations to inspect cargo heading into or out of North Korea in order to block smuggling (Associated Press III/International Herald Tribune, July 10). Back to top       Former Russian PM Worried by Pakistani Nukes A former Russian prime minister warned that ties between Pakistan’s intelligence service and terrorist organizations could lead the country’s nuclear weapons to land in the wrong hands, the Press Trust of India reported yesterday (see GSN, June 11). “It is widely known that Taliban and al-Qaeda were created by Pakistan’s [Interservices Intelligence agency],” Yevgeny Primakov said in a press conference in Moscow. “The current development cause deep concerns about in whose hands these [nuclear] weapons will fall,” he added, referring to recent activity by Pakistani extremists. Mikhail Margelov, chairman of the foreign affairs committee in Russia’s upper house of parliament, pointed to Islamic extremism as a matter of concern, PTI reported. “The developments in Sudan, Gaza, Iraq, Afghanistan, unresolved nuclear issue of Iran and now Pakistan have shown the trend when the Islamic radicals have emerged as a frightening force and their agenda has expanded to the quest for power,” he said (Press Trust of India, July 10). Back to top       Elevated Radioactivity Reported Near Los Alamos A nuclear watchdog group has found significant amounts of radioactivity in dust and dirt samples collected around the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, Aug. 10, 2006). The Government Accountability Project took 79 samples from homes, businesses and public areas around the nuclear laboratory, said Tom Carpenter, head of the group’s Nuclear Oversight Campaign.  The report indicates a need for more extensive investigation of how the radioactive dust spreads and affects northern New Mexico, he added. “We think dust pathways are ignored,” Carpenter said. The study said the indoor and outdoor radioactive particles “most likely” came from Los Alamos.  However, laboratory officials contested the report’s conclusions. “The primary source of the radioactivity on the indoor dust is not from the laboratory,” said Craig Eberhart, a Los Alamos environmental scientist. Most of the reported radiation came from naturally occurring sources, according to the laboratory.  Some is likely to have resulted from global nuclear testing rather than work at Los Alamos, scientists at the nuclear weapons facility told AP. Officials at Los Alamos maintained that the study produced no new information and argued that the laboratory is not a health threat to its neighbors (Deborah Baker, Associated Press, July 11). Back to top

Bush Boosts Biodefense Budget Request The Bush administration’s fiscal 2008 budget request would provide $309 million more for civilian biodefense than its previous request, boosting funding for the Health and Human Services, Defense and Agriculture departments, the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Biosecurity said Monday (see GSN, June 11). The Homeland Security Department and other agencies, though, would receive less funding, according to an article written by two center analysts. The White House request for civilian biodefense totals $5.42 billion.  Nearly 80 percent of the funds would go to Health and Human Services, which researches treatments for infectious diseases through the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control. The CDC BioSurveillance initiative, a project to develop an early-warning system tracking the spread of dangerous biological agents, would receive a $10 million boost for a total budget of $88 million. The budget would nearly double the budget of the U.S. Agriculture Department biodefense program, for a total of $340 million. Funding for the Food Emergency Response Network would increase to $19 million, from $2 million from the present fiscal year.  The network of food laboratories is expanding across the country and being equipped to rapidly test large volumes of food for dangerous biological agents. The budget of the Agricultural Research Service would be increased to $58 million, from $23 million.  The service researches sources of manmade and natural food contamination and creates systems to survey the food supply and detect biological threats.  Pest detection and animal health monitoring programs would receive a $42 million increase to total $119 million. The Defense Department would receive a 23 percent increase in funding for biodefense projects.  Pentagon programs include civil support teams to respond to WMD attacks and a threat reduction program to locate, collect and destroy deadly biological agents produced by the former Soviet Union. The Homeland Security Department would receive $26 million less in 2008 than in the 2007 budget cycle, a 7 percent reduction attributable to the elimination of the Metropolitan Medical Response System, a program for preparing medical first responders for public health emergencies, according to the center. The Environmental Protection Agency would experience across-the-board cuts in funding for its homeland security initiatives in the proposed budget, including a decrease of 8.5 percent or $14.2 million for biodefense. Requested funding for State Department biodefense programs would fall 10.4 million, to $53.5 million (Franco/Deitch, Biosecurity and Bioterrorism, July 2007). Back to top       U.S. Launches Pandemic Rating System By Jon Fox Global Security Newswire WASHINGTON — The U.S. Health and Human Services Department has initiated a pandemic rating system similar to that used to grade hurricanes, scaling viral events from one to five based on their severity, the agency’s chief response planner said yesterday (see GSN, July 3). The Pandemic Severity Index, formally announced in February, allows people to “conceptualize what we mean” when officials begin talking about the extent of a widespread infectious event, said Rear Adm. Craig Vanderwagen, HHS assistant secretary for preparedness and response. “We can talk about a category one which would be basically a seasonal flu which is maybe a little more than the usual seasonal flu up to a category five, which would be a 1918-like event or maybe even more severe than that,” he said at meeting of the National Infrastructure Advisory Council here. “I think we all live under the specter of a 1918-type episode,” said Erle Nye, chairman of the advisory committee. The 1918 flu pandemic killed between 50 and 100 million people worldwide in about a year and a half. The advisory board recently submitted a report to the Health and Human Services Department designed to help the government set the vaccination schedule for crucial health and emergency response workers during a pandemic.  In the event of limited resources, those workers most vital to the continued functioning of the emergency and health care response systems would be the first to receive prophylactic care. Back to top       Iowa Funds Pneumonic Plague Vaccine Research Scientists at Iowa State University have received more than $150,000 from the state of Iowa for a project that aims to make a protective vaccination against pneumonic plague, the Des Moines Register reported last week (see GSN, March 26). Pneumonic plague’s ability to quickly spread and resist antibiotic treatment makes it a likely biological weapon choice for terrorists, said researcher Michael Wannemuehler, who is leading a three-professor team on the project. He said his team’s research could also have applications in the fight against anthrax, influenza and severe acute respiratory syndrome. “If we can immunize against viral pathogens so there’s a good immune response, we may be better able to control diseases,” Wannemuehler said (Bonnie Harris, Des Moines Register). Back to top

Hearing Set on Chemical Agent Waste Transfer A hearing is scheduled for Monday in federal court in Indiana on an injunction request to halt U.S. Army transfers of nerve agent disposal waste to Texas, The Pueblo Chieftain reported yesterday (see GSN, June 19). The Army in spring began shipping wastewater produced by VX nerve agent neutralization in Newport, Indiana, to a private incineration facility in Port Arthur, Texas.  Local and national environmentalists teamed up in May to file suit against the Army transfers of hydrolysate and are seeking a court order to prevent further shipments. The plaintiffs have argued that the neutralized waste is still harmful and that the Army evaded normal procedures before beginning the transfers (see GSN, May 7).  The environmental groups also have petitioned Representative Ted Poe (R-Texas) and state and local officials to intervene, the Chieftain reported.  The Army voluntarily stopped wastewater transfers pending the federal court issues a decision.  Roughly 360,000 of the proposed 2 million gallons of wastewater had been hauled by tanker truck to Texas before shipments halted. Officials in Pueblo, Colo., site of another chemical depot, are closely following the case, the Chieftain reported.  Officials there have urged the depot to conduct on-site treatment of wastewater produced by mustard agent neutralization at a facility that has yet to be built.  They argue that lawsuits and delays could result from shipping the waste (John Norton, The Pueblo Chieftain, July 10). Back to top       D.C. Metro Floated as Anti-Nerve Agent Test Site A lobbyist has sought congressional backing for a nerve agent antidote pilot project in the Washington, D.C., transit system, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, June 25). Lynn Johnson, lobbyist for King Pharmaceuticals Inc., said he pitched the plan to House Appropriations Committee member Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.) earlier this year.  The proposal sought federal funding to disperse disposable injectors containing nerve agent antidote around the transit system covering the capital region.  “If there is a nerve gas attack, you need to have supplies close at hand,” said James Green, an executive at the Tennessee pharmaceutical firm.  King Pharmaceuticals alone provides the U.S. military with the auto-injector nerve agent antidote, along with supplying local emergency agencies, states and the governments of other nations. The antidotes, atropine and pralidoxime, must be used within 15 minutes of an attack to work, Green said.  The auto-injector pens contain one dose of the drug and are designed to be easily administered. The Washington, D.C., subway is a potential terrorist target and would be a perfect proving ground for the injectors, Johnson said.  Terrorists killed 12 people with the nerve agent sarin in a 1995 Tokyo subway attack (see GSN, Mar. 21).  Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority spokeswoman Cathy Asato said the agency was never contacted about the project.  While the agency has conducted subway attack drills, it is not planning to install auto-injectors any time soon, she added. There was much congressional interest in the injectors three years ago but other security priorities took precedence and obscured the project, Green said. King Pharmaceuticals does not expect Congress to act on the proposal this year, AP reported (Dibya Sarkar, Associated Press/Forbes.com, July 11). Back to top       Activists Question Army CW Disposal Plan at Umatilla Environmentalists have taken issue with the U.S. Army’s decision to begin burning a new chemical agent at the Umatilla Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Oregon without first replacing the filters in the incinerator’s smoke stack., Defense Environment Alert reported yesterday (see GSN, July 10). The plant last week completed disposal of weapons containing the nerve agent sarin, and is scheduled to begin eliminating VX nerve agent weapons following a changeover period. The Oregon Environmental Quality Department last month voided a permit requirement that the Army after finishing off the sarin replace carbon filters intended to catch any weapons agent that was not fully incinerated.  One agency official said there is no risk in not changing the filters because sensors in the smoke stacks have never detected any chemical agent entering the atmosphere through the stacks. The environmental advocacy organization Group Against Smog and Pollution said it is “very concerned about the potential impacts that could result if the carbon filters are not replaced between different agent campaigns.  What will result from mixing [sarin], VX, heavy metals, dioxins, furans … and then collecting them in the PFS carbon?” Morrow County, the county next to Umatilla County, said in a filed comment that it “does not agree with the proposed changes in the (Army’s disposal permit).  There appears to be a lack of supporting information that ensures the carbon absorption in the units will not be adversely affected by these changes.” Another Army plan to incinerate mustard agent mixed with mercury at Tooele, Utah, has come under fire from the Chemical Weapons Working Group.  The watchdog group has called for an environmental impact statement on the project under the National Environmental Policy Act (Defense Environment Alert, July 10). Back to top

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