North Korea has placed about 4,000 fuel rods in a cooling pond at Yongbyon, similar to these shown in storage in 1996 (U.S. State Department photo). North Korea Halfway Done With Removing Nuclear Fuel Rods North Korea has removed at least 4,000 nuclear fuel rods from its Yongbyon nuclear reactor and placed them in a nearby cooling pond, passing the halfway mark in its effort to disable the key plutonium production facility under a six-nation denuclearization agreement, Kyodo News reported yesterday (see GSN, July 17)...Full Story

U.S. Confers with World Powers Before Iran Talks A high-level U.S. State Department official yesterday spoke with nuclear negotiators from five other nations and the European Union ahead of a multilateral discussion with Iran planned for tomorrow on the Islamic state’s controversial nuclear activities, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, July 17)...Full Story

Final HEU Shipment Removed From Bulgaria U.S. specialists yesterday completed the removal of 14 pounds of Soviet-origin highly enriched uranium from Bulgaria, making the former Soviet state the second to remove all of its Cold War-era HEU fuel, the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration announced (see GSN, June 19)...Full Story

	Friday, July 18, 2008

Russia Charges Man With Iranian Smuggling Effort Russian prosecutors have accused a man of trying to illicitly supply Iran with tantalum, a metal used in building nuclear reactors, missile components and chemical treatment technology, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 13, 2007). Uzbek citizen Anar Godzhayev has been charged with violating Russian customs regulations, the Russian prosecutor general’s office said in a statement.  A Russian firm founded by Godzhayev regularly conducts business with the Middle Eastern state, AP reported. According to prosecutors, Godzhayev failed to accurately declare the contents of a delivery after he had received a request in July 2007 to send more than a ton of tantalum products to Iran.  He was arrested after customs agents inspected the shipment’s contents on an Iran-bound ship. Godzhayev is being held in southwestern Russia and could soon be tried for the allegations, AP said. (Associated Press/Google News, July 17). Back to top       China Issues WMD Response Booklet The Chinese Public Security Ministry yesterday released a guidebook outlining procedures for responding to a potential WMD attack during next month’s Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, the Xinhua News Agency reported (see GSN, July 17). The manual, compiled by counterterrorism experts at the request of Chinese police officials, contains instructions for spotting a terrorist plot or surviving an attack involving chemical, biological, nuclear or conventional weapons. "The book is practical.  If correctly following its instruction, citizens are very much likely to escape and even stop a terrorist attack," the Chinese agency said in a statement (Xinhua News Agency/People’s Daily, July 17). Back to top       N.C. University to Open WMD Suit Testing Facility North Carolina State University plans Monday to open a new laboratory for developing and testing WMD protection suits for emergency responders to wear after a chemical or biological weapon attack, the university announced (see GSN, Jan. 30). The school plans to offer tours of the Man-in-Simulant Test Facility after the opening ceremony (North Carolina State University release, July 17). Back to top

North Korea Halfway Done With Removing Nuclear Fuel Rods North Korea has removed at least 4,000 nuclear fuel rods from its Yongbyon nuclear reactor and placed them in a nearby cooling pond, passing the halfway mark in its effort to disable the key plutonium production facility under a six-nation denuclearization agreement, Kyodo News reported yesterday (see GSN, July 17). Pyongyang had removed half of the reactor’s fuel rods as of last week, according to sources familiar with the six-party talks. The process of disabling the reactor has had fits and starts since beginning in December.  North Korea can safely remove as many as 80 fuel rods in one day, but Pyongyang slowed the process to as few as 15 each day as it complained of the slow arrival of aid under the six-party deal, Kyodo reported (see GSN, May 13). North Korea has since increased its rate of removal to about 30 fuel rods daily, but an October deadline set last week could force the nation to speed up the process even more. "If North Korea is to finish disablement by that time frame, it would have to speed up the rate of discharging the fuel rods," one source said (Kyodo News/AOL News, July 17). Top foreign officials from the six nations plan to take part in informal denuclearization talks in Singapore next week, bringing the top diplomats together for the first time since North Korean nuclear negotiations began in 2003, the Associated Press reported today. The meeting on the sidelines of the ASEAN forum is expected to include North Korean Foreign Minister Pak Ui Chun, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and their counterparts from South Korea, China, Japan and Russia, a South Korean official told AP (Burt Herman, Associated Press/Google News, July 18). Back to top       U.S. Confers with World Powers Before Iran Talks A high-level U.S. State Department official yesterday spoke with nuclear negotiators from five other nations and the European Union ahead of a multilateral discussion with Iran planned for tomorrow on the Islamic state’s controversial nuclear activities, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, July 17). U.S. Undersecretary of State William Burns met in Brussels yesterday with EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and spoke by telephone with delegates from China, France, Germany, Russia and the United Kingdom.  On Saturday, Burns is expected to become the first U.S. diplomat to engage Iran in formal negotiations since the countries cut ties in 1980, according to AFP. "Mr. Solana told Mr. Burns that his participation could only have a positive impact," said Solana spokeswoman Cristina Gallach.  "We hope the Iranians are going to understand the importance of this [U.S.] decision" to participate in the Geneva talks (Agence France-Presse/Google News, July 17). Burns also held a 20-minute meeting today with International Atomic Energy Chief Mohamed ElBaradei, the Associated Press reported. Iran, the six nations and the European Union plan to discuss an offer of economic and financial incentives Tehran would receive for halting its uranium enrichment program, an effort that could yield a key ingredient for a nuclear bomb.  Iran has consistently refused to stop the program, contending it is only aimed at producing nuclear power plant fuel (Suzan Fraser, Associated Press I/Washington Post, July 18). U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told journalists yesterday:  "The point that we're making is the United States is firmly behind this diplomacy, firmly behind and unified with our allies and hopefully the Iranians will take that message," the Xinhua News Agency reported. "It's going to be very clear to them that the international community and P5-plus-1 are completely united," Rice said, referring to the five permanent U.N. Security Council member nations and Germany (Xinhua News Agency, July 17). Burns is expected to meet with Rice in the United Arab Emirates to give her details on tomorrow’s meeting once it unfolds, AFP reported. "It will be an opportunity for him to brief her in person," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said yesterday (Agence France-Presse II/Google News, July 17). Iran today expressed cautious optimism about the discussions. "The new negotiation process (and) the participation of a U.S. diplomat look positive from the outset, but we hope that is reflected in the talks," Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said (Fraser, AP I). Mottaki yesterday discussed the nuclear impasse in a meeting with Syria’s president and foreign minister.  Their talks took place at the request of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who recently asked Syria to help mediate in the dispute. At a joint news briefing after the meeting, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said Tehran’s peaceful nuclear ambitions had been “confirmed to us by our brothers in Iran” (Albert Aji, Associated Press/Google News, July 17). Senior Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili today said the multilateral talks would be “constructive” if the United States adopts a positive tone, AFP reported. "What is important for us is with what approach they come to the talks.  If it is with a constructive approach, and that they refrain from past mistakes, then for sure we will have constructive talks," Iranian state media quoted him as saying (Agence France-Presse III/Space War, July 18). Meanwhile, a U.S. Senate panel has approved a new package of unilateral U.S. sanctions against Iran over its nuclear work, U.S. Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) announced yesterday. The “Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability and Divestment Act — passed by the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee by an overwhelming margin — is intended “to maximize the economic leverage on Iran’s leaders to bring them to the negotiating table by tightening economic sanctions and authorizing divestment from companies that do business with Iran’s key oil sector,” Dodd said in a statement. “The legislation also cracks down on the illegal diversion of sensitive U.S. technologies to Iran,” he said (U.S. Senator Chris Dodd release, July 17). Elsewhere, U.S. and European officials yesterday warned that the Bush administration had not yet given final approval to place a U.S. interests section in Iran, the New York Times reported. According to one European official, Burns had recently indicated to diplomats in Tokyo that Secretary Rice is determined to win approval for the diplomatic outpost in Tehran, but the proposal could still be blocked by administration conservatives. “My feeling is that the decision was more or less taken and the administration’s problem was when and how to announce it,” the official said.  “They want to do it, but for domestic political reasons they don’t know how and when, and maybe even if, they can do it” (Sciolino/Stolberg, New York Times, July 18). State Department spokesman McCormack did not confirm or refute the plan reported yesterday by the London Guardian. However, he said:  "There's not going to be any discussion of that at this (U.S.-Iran) meeting on Saturday" (AFP II). Back to top       Final HEU Shipment Removed From Bulgaria U.S. specialists yesterday completed the removal of 14 pounds of Soviet-origin highly enriched uranium from Bulgaria, making the former Soviet state the second to remove all of its Cold War-era HEU fuel, the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration announced (see GSN, June 19). NNSA officials placed the spent reactor fuel in sealed casks and secretly moved it by truck, train and ship to a secured storage site in western Russia.  An earlier Bulgarian HEU transfer, completed in late 2003, consisted of 37.3 pounds of fresh fuel (see GSN, Dec. 29, 2003). “The complete removal of all highly enriched uranium from Bulgaria is another milestone in NNSA’s cooperative effort to reduce the threat of nuclear proliferation and prevent nuclear terrorism,” NNSA chief Thomas D’Agostino said in a statement.  “Bulgaria’s commitment to remove and secure dangerous nuclear and radiological material at civilian nuclear sites demonstrates the international commitment to nonproliferation and global threat reduction.” The shipment was completed under the U.S. agency’s Global Threat Reduction Initiative, which worked closely with officials from Bulgaria, Russia, Romania, Ukraine and the International Atomic Energy Agency.  The initiative has also helped to improve security at 28 Bulgarian nuclear sites. The program has removed all U.S.-origin HEU fuel from 13 nations, including South Korea, Brazil and Spain.  In May, the NNSA effort completed the removal of Soviet-origin HEU from Latvia (see GSN, May 16; U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration release, July 17). Back to top

Mustard Traces Found at Umatilla Chemical Depot Workers at the Umatilla Chemical Depot in Oregon encountered a trace quantity of mustard agent vapor during a routine inspection of a storage unit holding tanks of the agent, the Tri-City Herald reported yesterday (see GSN, May 20). A passive filter system prevented the blister agent from escaping to the outside environment, and workers installed a powered filter system as an additional safety precaution, said depot spokesman Jim Hackett. Depot personnel plan to find and decontaminate the leaking bulk container (Mary Hopkin, Tri-City Herald, July 17). Back to top

Senate Deal Keeps Funds for Czech Radar By Otto Kreisher CongressDaily WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee unanimously approved the fiscal 2009 Military Construction-VA funding bill yesterday but only after resolving a dispute over Bush administration missile defense plans that brought a highly unusual partisan 15-14 split on the initial vote for approval (see GSN, July 16). The party-line vote came when Senate Appropriations Chairman Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) rejected the request of Military Construction-VA Appropriations Subcommittee ranking member Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) to defer consideration of the bill until she could reach an agreement on the source of funding for the proposed missile-defense radar site in the Czech Republic. By the time the committee had disposed of two other funding bills, Hutchison had negotiated a compromise with Military Construction-VA Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Tim Johnson (D-S.D.) and all the Republicans changed their votes to give the draft measure a 29-0 approval. Although Byrd said he was determined to bring all the appropriations bills to the floor, enactment of any of the spending bills this year is doubtful because House Democratic leaders have said they would not attempt to pass any of them. The Senate bill would provide a total of $119.7 billion, of which $73 billion is discretionary funding, $3.65 billion over President Bush's request.  Most of the increase went into the $48 billion in discretionary funds for the Veterans Affairs Department, including $41.1 billion for healthcare programs. The increase included $250 million to fund a new VA rural healthcare initiative to extend care to veterans who live far from VA facilities.  The bill provided $1.2 billion — double the president's request — for VA major construction projects, and $1.1 billion for repairs and maintenance to reduce an estimated $6 billion worth of deficiencies that resulted in code violations. Back to top

Chertoff Seeks More Radiation Scans on Small Planes Conducting radiation screens of small aircraft entering the United States is a top priority for the U.S. Homeland Security Department, Secretary Michael Chertoff said yesterday.  He reaffirmed earlier concerns that terrorists could try to smuggle radiological materials for “dirty bombs” on small planes or boats, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, June 19). In testimony to the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, Chertoff also worried that terrorists are recruiting new members with European Union passports that might receive less scrutiny at U.S. borders. “Terrorists are deliberately focusing on people who have legitimate Western European passports, who don't appear to have records as terrorists," he said.  “I have a good degree of confidence we can catch people coming in. But I have to tell you ... there's no guarantee. And they are working very hard to slip by us” (Eileen Sullivan, Associated Press/Washington Post, July 18).   Back to top

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