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Where is Saddam? Where are these arsenals, if they were really there, and what is happening with them? Maybe Saddam is sitting somewhere in a secret bunker and plans to blow all this stuff up soon, at the last second, threatening hundreds of human lives. We don’t know anything. These questions must be answered.
—Russian President Vladimir Putin, demanding confirmation that Iraq is WMD-free before agreeing to lift sanctions.
By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire
THE HAGUE — The International Committee of the Red Cross says it was excluded from addressing the first review conference of the Chemical Weapons Convention because of its view that the conference should formally address the issue of chemical incapacitants, such as riot control agents...Full Story 
By Jim Wurst
Global Security Newswire
GENEVA — The role of nuclear weapons in international relations — both in their numbers and in the strategies in which they are employed — was the focus of much of the debate during the first two days of the annual meeting of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (see GSN, April 28)...Full Story
In last week’s trilateral talks in Beijing, North Korea said its negotiators told U.S. officials a decade ago it had nuclear weapons, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said yesterday (see GSN, April 29)...Full Story
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Wednesday, April 30, 2003 |  | | |  |
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The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission yesterday issued three new orders meant to improve security at the nation’s 103 nuclear power plants (see GSN, April 9).
In one order, the commission has approved changes to the design basis threat, which is the largest terrorist attack that a nuclear power plant’s security force must be able to defend against. Details on the changes, however, will not be released to the public, according to an NRC press release.
The NRC has also ordered new measures related to nuclear plant security guards’ fitness for duty and work hours. The new order is designed to ensure that “excessive work hours do not challenge the ability of nuclear power plant security forces to remain vigilant and effectively perform their duties in protecting the plants,” the commission said.
The commission has also ordered new requirements for improved training and qualification programs for plant security forces, which include an increase in firearm training. Details on the increased training requirements will also not be released to the public, according to the commission. The new plant security measures will be effective “immediately,” but will also allow for a transition period for nuclear plant operators, the commission said.
“With the completion of these complementary orders, the public should be reassured that the nation’s nuclear power plants are well-secured against potential threats,” NRC Chairman Nils Diaz said in a statement (U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission release, April 29).
A new U.S. intelligence center designed to improve information sharing among U.S. counterterrorism agencies is set to open tomorrow, but some experts have predicted that interagency disputes will hamper the new center’s effectiveness (see GSN, April 28).
The new center, the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC), will involve a number of U.S. agencies, including the Homeland Security Department, the CIA, the FBI and the Defense Department’s intelligence agencies, according to the Chicago Tribune. As late as last week, however, the FBI had not named someone to lead its involvement in the new center. In addition, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and congressional officials have said it could take at least another year before agreements are in place granting the agencies access to each other’s raw intelligence information.
“I know they’re determined to get it going in the next two to three months on a preliminary basis. (But) it probably will not be fully functional at least for a year, is my guess," Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon forum last month.
Some congressional officials have said the delays may help the center because of the rivalries among the various agencies.
“It will have so many enemies — better that it moves slowly and surely,” an official said. “There are enough people out there who have a vested interest in not doing it this way. They will be waiting for missteps so they can step away,” the official added.
One former senior U.S. official doubted that the old rivalries among the various agencies could be overcome.
“The TTIC was, in a sense, imposed on everybody, so there is nobody out there who owns it right now, and that doesn’t help,” the former senior official said. “We were persuasive in getting the president to announce it, which is putting a lot of oomph behind it. But I think there is going to be a lot of foot-dragging,” the official added (Cam Simpson, Chicago Tribune, April 30).
Even though the new center will help improve interagency access to raw intelligence information on potential threats, that information must still be effectively analyzed, which is a difficult task, according to experts.
One concern is the time factor, according to counterterrorism officials and ex-CIA analysts. To be effective, information on possible terrorist activities must be analyzed quickly, which could make it difficult to properly evaluate often-unreliable sources, they said.
“Intelligence is put out, and then we go and investigate or try to collect additional intelligence to say, ‘Here’s the texture of it? … Was it good intelligence? Was it hard?’” a senior counterterrorism official said. “We try to work as quickly as we can to add that texture, but it takes time,” the official added (Cam Simpson, Chicago Tribune II, April 30),
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U.S. officials have said that all captured senior Iraqi officials are denying during interrogations that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, April 29).
Many of the officials are lying to distance themselves from former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, an official said.
“They are all sticking to that story,” the official said. “They’ve got every reason to lie, at least initially,” the official added (John Lumpkin, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, April 30).
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said yesterday that he believed U.S. forces would find evidence of that country’s WMD efforts.
“On the … question of weapons of mass destruction, they will be found,” Powell said during testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Powell also expressed confidence in the reliability of U.S. intelligence on Iraq’s WMD efforts, revisiting his February U.N. Security Council briefing (see GSN, Feb. 5).
“The presentation I made before the United Nations on the 5th of February was at the end of four straight days of living with the entire intelligence community and going over every single thing we knew,” Powell said. “What I presented on that day was information that was all source and that had other backup to it, and not just what they saw in the presentation. Everything we had there had backup and double sourcing and triple sourcing,” he said (Federal News Service transcript, April 30).
Sanctions
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin said yesterday that sanctions against Iraq should not be lifted until it can be determined that the country no longer possesses weapons of mass destruction (see GSN, April 25).
The U.S.-led coalition justified its war against Iraq on the basis of that country’s possession of prohibited weapons, and that issue must be resolved before sanctions can be lifted, Putin said after talks with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
“Where is Saddam? Where are these arsenals, if they were really there, and what is happening with them? Maybe Saddam is sitting somewhere in a secret bunker and plans to blow all this stuff up soon, at the last second, threatening hundreds of human lives,” Putin said. “We don’t know anything. These questions must be answered,” he said (Steve Gutterman, Associated Press/Boston Globe, April 30).
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By Jim Wurst
Global Security Newswire
GENEVA — The role of nuclear weapons in international relations — both in their numbers and in the strategies in which they are employed — was the focus of much of the debate during the first two days of the annual meeting of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (see GSN, April 28).
Many of the nuclear weapons states on Monday and Tuesday claimed progress in nuclear disarmament, citing the reduction in the total number of these weapons, while non-nuclear states argued that strategies, including the willingness to use nuclear weapons pre-emptively, show that the nuclear powers do not intend to rid themselves of these weapons.
Ambassador John Wolf of the United States said Monday that while “the path for nuclear proliferation is spiraling upward, ... disarmament continues. … We are leading that process and will continue to do so.” He said that under the U.S.-Russian Strategic Offensive Reduction Treaty, also known as the Moscow Treaty, the United States “will cut the number of strategic weapons … by two-thirds to 1,700 to 2,200 by 2012.”
“Nuclear arms reduction[s] are a priority,” said Alexander Mostovets, deputy director in the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department of Security and Disarmament Affairs. “By its practical actions our country confirms its commitment to strict fulfillment of its obligations in the sphere of nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation.” He called the Moscow Treaty part of the NPT commitment to disarmament.
New Zealand’s minister of disarmament, Marian Hobbs, said Monday that the Moscow Treaty is “a positive step,” but that the reductions called for “are not a substitute for irreversible cuts” in nuclear weapons. The treaty calls for removing nuclear warheads from strategic delivery vehicles, but not for destroying the warheads. She added, “Evolving security policies [that] continue to be based on the possession of nuclear weapons ... can only further destabilize the global security environment and the NPT regime.”
Jayantha Dhanapala, the U.N. undersecretary general for disarmament, called the Moscow Treaty “a welcomed development indeed, even considering that the treaty did not require the physical destruction of a single warhead.” Speaking at a separate event yesterday, however, he said there is “virtually no transparency in these reductions, and certainly no independent verification.”
“Neither the endless pursuit of unilateral defensive measures nor the perpetual drive for military superiority can produce a world free of nuclear weapons; such steps are more likely to produce a world full of nuclear weapons,” Dhanapala said. “The more horrible flaws in such strategies are critically examined, the more attractive nuclear disarmament becomes as a practical and effective alternative,” he said.
France and the United Kingdom said they were reducing their nuclear arsenals to the minimum.
French Ambassador Hubert de la Fortelle said the stockpiles of the five nuclear powers have been “drastically reduced since the end of the Cold War — and I wish to emphasize the fact that France has borne its full share of that effort — and while the prospect of global reduction remains assured for the years to come, we are obliged to note that the commitment to nonproliferation is not being scrupulously observed by some states.”
“The U.K. has already reduced its nuclear weapons to a single system at the minimum level necessary for the U.K.’s national security,” said British Ambassador David Broucher. “When we are satisfied that sufficient progress has been made that would allow us to include British nuclear weapons in multilateral negotiations without endangering our security interests, we will do so,” he added.
Chinese Ambassador Hu Xiaodi criticized the other nuclear powers, especially “countries possessing the largest nuclear arsenals,” for not committing to reductions “in an irreversible, effectively verifiable and legally binding manner” and for maintaining security policies “based on the first use of nuclear weapons.”
Iran Mentioned as Proliferation Threat
Like the United States on Monday, the United Kingdom and France yesterday focused on Iran as a proliferation threat, but in language less harsh than was used by the United States. De la Fortelle of France said Iran’s nuclear program, “due to its scale, its diversity and its technical sophistication, is a source of concern as to its actual purpose. … It is the responsibility of Tehran to commit itself resolutely and unambiguously to a policy of openness and transparency,” he said. Broucher of the United Kingdom said, “We welcome Iran’s recent cooperation with the [International Atomic Energy Agency], but also express our concern regarding the recent disclosures made about the scope and scale of its nuclear program.”
In response, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Khoshroo said his government “has been in constant cooperation with the IAEA and has fully complied with its obligations under its safeguards agreements. … We are providing substantiated information in great detail and with complete transparency to address the questions in order to reassure those states, who have raised them in good faith, of our full compliance.”
Syria and other Arab countries countered saying Israel, with a nuclear program outside the NPT, is the real proliferation threat in the region.
The divisions among the five permanent members of the Security Council over Iraq continued into the NPT meeting. While the United States barely mentioned Iraq’s nuclear weapons potential — one of the original justifications for invading the country — France and Russia repeated their objections against the U.S. invasion.
De la Fortelle said the resumed inspections “confirmed that the Iraqi [nuclear] program had not been restarted. … It will be the responsibility of the inspectors to recommence their work and to submit their conclusions as soon as they are able.”
Mostovets of Russia said his government was “convinced that the process of the post-war settlement in the Middle East and Iraq in particular should be brought back into [the] international legal framework based on already available mechanisms accountable to the U.N. Security Council.”
In last week’s trilateral talks in Beijing, North Korea said its negotiators told U.S. officials a decade ago it had nuclear weapons, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said yesterday (see GSN, April 29).
Powell said, however, that U.S. officials who negotiated the 1994 Agreed Framework dispute the contention.
Last week, North Korean officials “indicated in an aside that they did have nuclear weapons, and they said they told it to the United States 10 years ago during the period when the Agreed Framework was being negotiated. We have checked with every single one of the negotiators on our side from that period and none of them say that the North Koreans actually told us that, although they came close,” Powell said during testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Powell also discussed the North Korean proposal, brought forward last week, which would discontinue Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile capability in return for U.S. economic, energy and diplomatic concessions.
“It is a proposal that is not going to take us in the direction we need to go. But nevertheless, we will study it. I think that’s appropriate,” he said (Federal News Service Transcript, April 29).
U.S. President George W. Bush rejected the North Korean plan, the Financial Times reported.
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer reiterated the U.S. policy not to grant concessions for what it views as belligerent behavior.
“We will not reward North Korea for bad behavior. What we seek is North Korea’s irrevocable and verifiable dismantlement of its nuclear weapons program. We will not provide them with inducement,” Fleischer said (Andrew Ward, Financial Times, April 30).
North-South Talks
Meanwhile North and South Korea completed three days of meetings in Pyongyang today, but reached no agreement to resolve the nuclear crisis.
The Cabinet-level talks produced a joint declaration to continue to address the issue.
“The two Koreas will discuss each other’s position earnestly over the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula and continue to cooperate in resolving the nuclear standoff peacefully through dialogue,” the statement said (Lim Chang-won, Agence France-Presse, April 30).
Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee yesterday rejected a recent Pakistani offer to travel to Islamabad for talks, a spokesman for Vajpayee’s political party said (see GSN, April 29).
“The prime minister can go to Pakistan if terrorism stops totally,” said Vijay Kumar Malhotra, a spokesman for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. “The prime minister said he has not accepted [Pakistani Prime Minister Zafarullah] Jamali’s invitation to visit Pakistan,” Malhotra said (China Daily, April 30).
Earlier this week, Jamali called Vajpayee and invited Indian officials to visit Pakistan to help resolve outstanding issues between the two nuclear-armed countries, such as the disputed Kashmir region. Jamali also said Pakistani officials were ready to travel to India.
Although Vajpayee has rejected Pakistan’s invitation, pressure remains on both countries from the United States to resume a dialogue, according to former Indian Foreign Secretary Mani Dixit.
“The general pressure on India and Pakistan to resume dialogue to avoid nuclear confrontation is the main policy plank of the Americans,” Dixit said. “Pressure is on. India is responding; so is Pakistan. But Prime Minister Vajpayee has said that cross-border terrorism must end,” he added (Kathy Gannon, Associated Press/Boston Globe, April 30).
The U.S. company OMEGA Engineering Inc. and its Chief Financial Officer Ralph Michel pleaded guilty yesterday to illegally exporting equipment to Pakistan that could have been used to develop nuclear weapons, according to the Associated Press.
Both the company and Michel pleaded guilty to violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the Export Administration Act, AP reported. Under the plea, OMEGA Engineering will pay a $313,000 fine. Michel faces up to 10 years in prison and a $50,000 fine when he is sentenced in mid-July.
“Our export control laws, particularly where there is a risk that exported materials may be used in the development of nuclear explosives, will be vigorously enforced and violations of these laws will not be tolerated,” Connecticut-based U.S. Attorney Kevin O’Connor said.
In 1997, the U.S. Commerce Department rejected OMEGA Engineering’s request for an export license to ship equipment to Pakistan, prosecutors said. At the time, the department was concerned that the equipment would be used in nuclear weapons or nuclear fuel activities, they said. After the department twice rejected the company’s export license request, however, Michel arranged for the equipment to still be shipped to a Pakistani state company, AP reported (Dave Collins, Associated Press/Newsday.com, April 30).
The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration announced last week that it will proceed with plans to convert 6.5 metric tons of plutonium into mixed oxide fuel at the Savannah River Site in Georgia (see GSN, April 24).
The NNSA released an Amended Record of Decision April 24 saying that the plutonium, originally intended for immobilization, would be converted to fuel instead.
“Today’s decision moves us one step closer to disposing of weapon-grade plutonium both here in the United States and in Russia,” said NNSA Acting Administrator Linton Brooks. “It also strengthens our effort to provide a pathway out of South Carolina for plutonium brought there for disposition,” he added (see GSN, Dec. 3, 2002).
Under a September 2000 agreement, Washington and Moscow agreed to dispose of 34 metric tons of plutonium each. Both countries plan to convert the plutonium into mixed oxide fuel, which is not easily used in nuclear weapons. In 2004, the plutonium disposal effort is scheduled to receive a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build the mixed oxide fuel facility. Construction will begin soon after, in conjunction with the building of a similar facility in Russia (NNSA release, April 24).
Albania deposited its instrument of ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty with the United Nations April 23 (see GSN, March 18). To date, 99 nations have ratified the treaty, including 31 of the 44 nations whose ratifications are necessary for the treaty to enter into force (CTBTO release, April 28).
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Canadian officials yesterday released a Brazilian ship from quarantine off the coast of Halifax after tests determined that anthrax was not responsible for the death of an Egyptian crewman onboard (see GSN, April 29). Brazilian officials said the cause of Ibrahim Saved Soliman Ibrahim’s death remains unknown (Shannon McCaffrey, Philadelphia Inquirer, April 30).
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By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire
THE HAGUE — The International Committee of the Red Cross says it was excluded from addressing the first review conference of the Chemical Weapons Convention because of its view that the conference should formally address the issue of chemical incapacitants, such as riot control agents. The treaty bans the use of such chemicals as a “method of warfare,” but it does allow their use for law enforcement purposes.
This review conference is the first opportunity for parties to formally examine the 1993 treaty’s effectiveness and to consider possible changes (see GSN, April 29). Treaty parties met for the third day today in a two-week general debate session, and states also began meeting yesterday in closed sessions. Adoption of final documents is scheduled for May 9.
The ICRC says it was originally told it could address the conference as an international organization, as it has at other formal treaty meetings, but then had that permission rescinded.
The ICRC is a unique organization responsible for monitoring international humanitarian law as established by the Geneva Conventions. Differing from traditional nongovernmental organizations, the ICRC generally is accorded “international organization status” akin to the World Health Organization and since 1990 has had “observer status” at the United Nations.
Other nongovernmental organizations were also prohibited from presenting directly to the conference, but several, including the ICRC, are scheduled to make presentations tomorrow afternoon at an off-site “open forum” organized by the conference. That forum, however, is scheduled at the same time as a formal treaty meeting, making it more difficult for nongovernmental views to reach conference delegates, some groups said.
ICRC Legal Division Adviser Robin Coupland said he did not know which countries had opposed his organization’s participation but was certain the reason was over the chemical incapacitants issue addressed in an organizational statement.
“The ICRC knows that the content of our statement was the reason the delivery of it was blocked. We are not aware of the country or countries responsible for the blocking,” he said.
“We have international organization status at many other disarmament conferences and we understood that we had the same here,” he said.
A U.S. official here told Global Security Newswire the United States and a few other unidentified countries had opposed ICRC participation, but only because of a rules issue. U.S. officials said allowing the ICRC to address the conference would open questions on where to draw the line barring other special organizations such as the World Health Organization.
A British delegate said London did not oppose ICRC participation and that the United States was the principal opponent.
Ambassador Wilhelm Schmid, Switzerland’s permanent representative to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons criticized the decision.
“I am very surprised as the head of the Swiss delegation that the ICRC is not being allowed to speak,” he said.
The ICRC presentation, copies of which were made available outside the conference room, expressed concern about increasing interest in incapacitating chemicals among police and military forces, but did not mention countries by name. It also criticized the conference for insufficient attention to the issue.
“We are concerned about the interest being shown in such agents as a means of warfare; we are concerned therefore by lack of attention being given to the implications of the development of such agents for law enforcement,” it said.
Some delegates here say they are concerned the treaty, in allowing development of incapacitants for law enforcement purposes, provides a loophole for states to develop them for military use. In an incident last year, Russian security forces used a chemical incapacitant to rescue hostages last year (see GSN, Oct. 30, 2002), and the U.S. Marine Corps has sponsored research into the agents (see GSN, Nov. 4, 2002).
For further information, see:
CWC Text
OPCW Main Page
CWC States Parties
Pentagon Executive Summary of CWC
A team from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons yesterday inspected a Pakistani fertilizer plant, Reuters reported (see GSN, April 23).
The three-member team visited the Fauji Jordan Fertilizer facility, the largest in Pakistan.
“The inspection will benefit Pakistan in terms of its credibility as a member state of the Chemical Weapons Convention,” said Pakistani Foreign Ministry official Tipu Sultan.
Sultan said the inspectors were not searching for chemical weapons like U.N. inspectors did in Iraq, but rather were investigating general operating conditions at the plant (Agence France-Presse/The Nation, April 30).
“They have inspected the health and environmental standards … they have nothing to do with chemical weapons inspection or any revelation with U.N. arms inspectors as reported by the newspapers,” Sultan said. “We briefed them on the measures taken by the fertilizer company on health and environment issues … they also inspected the main plant,” he added (Reuters/Planet Ark, April 30).
Germany is set to provide more than $32 million to Russia to aid in its chemical weapons disposal efforts, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported yesterday (see GSN, April 28). The funding will be used to help build a second destruction line at Russia’s sole chemical weapons disposal plant, located in Gorny, and to build an additional disposal facility in the city of Kambarka (RFE/RL, April 29).
The U.S. Army has completed the final stages of chemical disposal on Johnston Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, the Associated Press reported today (see GSN, Sept. 9, 2002).
Army officials have now disposed of all cleanup materials, including plastic, sludge, concrete, hoses and aluminum, which were generated by the destruction of 400,000 chemical munitions and 2,000 tons of chemical agents on the island, AP reported.
“This is a significant accomplishment toward the elimination of chemical weapons,” said site manager Gary McCloskey. He said the Army has “completed the safe thermal processing of the stored secondary wastes that were generated from the destruction of the chemical agents and weapons.”
Johnston Atoll, an unincorporated U.S. territory, lies 825 southwest of Hawaii. The chemical destruction took almost 10 years and was completed in 2000. Officials plan to close the operation by the end of this year, and the island will then be transferred to the Interior Department, which will incorporate it into the Johnston Atoll National Wildlife Refuge (David Briscoe, Associated Press/Honolulu Star-Bulletin, April 27).
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A shortage of booster rockets could be behind the cancellation of several missile defense tests this year, Inside Missile Defense reported today (see GSN, April 18).
“You can only produce so many boosters a year … if you want 20 boosters in [Fort] Greely, [Alaska,] you have to give up something,” a source said this week.
The Missile Defense Agency plans to test boosters from Lockheed Martin and Orbital Sciences soon (see GSN, April 29), and production could follow shortly, but the companies are expected to turn the rockets out slowly.
The Missile Defense Agency recently informed Congress that it plans to significantly alter its testing plans for the national missile defense system after Boeing, the lead contractor on the Ground-based Midcourse Defense system, suggested the testing changes, according to an agency spokesman (Duffy/Costa, Inside Missile Defense, April 30).
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2002 by National Journal Group, Inc. The material in this section is produced independently for NTI by National Journal Group, Inc. Any reproduction or retransmission, in whole or in part, is a violation of federal law and is strictly prohibited without the consent of the National Journal Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
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