Al-Qaeda:  ISIS Finds No Evidence of Nukes

There is currently no credible evidence indicating that al-Qaeda possesses nuclear weapons or even sufficient material to produce them, according to an article to be published in the January/February issue of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.  Lead author David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, said he could not exclude the possibility that al-Qaeda possesses fissile material, but had no evidence of such possession (see related GSN story, today).

Albright cautioned, however, that if al-Qaeda successfully obtained enough plutonium or highly enriched uranium, it would have the capability to produce a crude nuclear explosive, especially if the organization had a base in Afghanistan where it could conduct nuclear research.  If al-Qaeda built crude nuclear weapons, it would probably deliver them by ship, truck or private plane—a difficult attack to counter, the article said.

Nations should establish an international group staffed or advised by experts that could investigate terrorists’ nuclear activities and coordinate with law enforcement and intelligence agencies, Albright said, noting that existing international organizations, such as the International Atomic Energy Agency, were not equipped to deal with the threat.

The authors suggested several other measures governments should take: search for evidence of nuclear activities in Afghanistan, locate any scientists or others who were involved in al-Qaeda or Taliban nuclear projects, strengthen efforts to find al-Qaeda cells that could conduct nuclear work, increase security of nuclear weapons and materials and enhance coordination between governments (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, January/February 2002).

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United States:  DOE Proposes Waste Disposal Cuts

U.S. Department of Energy cleanup “czar” Jesse Roberson has proposed a dramatic change in the way that officials would deal with the 53 million gallons of highly radioactive nuclear waste at the Hanford former plutonium production facility in Washington, the Tri-City Herald reported last week.

In a memo to the department’s budget office, Roberson proposed cutting vitrification programs at Hanford by at least 75 percent.  Vitrification is the process used to turn potentially leaky nuclear waste into glass.  The Hanford plant has more “tank waste” stored in its 177 underground tanks than all other Energy Department sites combined, but it is the only Energy Department site without a vitrification plant, the Herald reported.

Todd Martin, chairman of the Hanford Advisory Board, circulated the department memo during a board meeting Dec. 6.  It addressed efforts by the department to reduce the estimated 70 years and $300 billion necessary to clean up waste at nuclear weapon production plants.

Roberson was looking for cheaper ways to dispose of wastes over the long term, said Todd Young, a spokesman for U.S. Representative Doc Hastings (R-Wash.).  The Energy Department proposal would not affect cleanup measures over the next decade, which would address 10 percent of the waste, he said.

The proposal angered many advisory board members and other officials.  “I don’t think we have [an Energy Department] that is reflective of the wishes of the Northwest,” said advisory board member Greg DeBruler.  “We have an agency reflective of the Washington, D.C., beltway.”

U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said, “It is time for the administration to understand that we will not let them renege on the promise made to clean up Hanford.”

Board members and other officials also cautioned that they did not yet know the context of the memo—whether it represents a brainstorming idea or a serious policy consideration and whether the 75 percent figure is arbitrary or backed by specific studies.  The board planned to ask Roberson for clarification, the Herald said (Stang/Cary, Tri-City Herald/Nuclear Control Institute release, Dec. 7).

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U.S.-Russia:  Nuclear Reduction Agreement Developing

The United States and Russia are close to working out and formalizing an agreement to reduce strategic nuclear weapons (see GSN, Dec. 10), officials said yesterday after a meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov in Moscow.   Speaking to reporters after their meeting, Powell and Ivanov said they hoped to have an agreement ready for signature when Presidents George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin meet next summer in Russia on a still-undetermined date.  Bush and Putin announced major reductions to U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear forces when they met last month in the United States (see GSN, Nov. 14).

What Form of Agreement?

The two sides appear to have agreed to sign a treaty-like agreement. Ivanov reaffirmed Russia’s desire for a “relevant legal formalization of this arrangement,” and Powell agreed.

“Both of us recognize the need for a codification of the new levels we are going to and we will be discussing the form that that might take.  It might be in the form of a treaty, or some other way of codifying it,” Powell said.

“The main thing is that there is an understanding expressed by both sides that these reductions need to be embodied in some form of treaty formalization.  During the negotiations, we will decide what form it will take,” Ivanov said.

What Kind of Verification Measures?

Powell expressed a preference for a system that “preserves the verification and transparency procedures that exist in current agreements,” and Ivanov called for “adequate control and transparency” (U.S. State Department release, Dec. 10).

How Low Will Russia Go?

At the U.S. summit last month, Putin said Russia would “respond in kind” to the Bush announcement that the United States would reduce to 1,700 to 2,200 deployed strategic nuclear warheads in the next 10 years.  Although some U.S. officials were expecting to hear a specific reciprocal Russian offer during Powell’s visit, “the Russians are still not giving a firm figure,” a U.S. official said.

Nevertheless, “we’ve got an idea, we’re close” to agreement, said the official (CNN.com, Dec. 10).

“A New Approach to Arms Control”

Any new agreement would differ from those in the past because it would be based on exchanging information and access instead of matching numbers of weapons to guarantee mutual deterrence, according to the Los Angeles Times.

“Full transparency can be a substitute for the voluminous arms control agreements that we’ve had in the past,” said a senior State Department official. 

“This introduces a new approach to arms control,” the official said.  “It’s an approach that says we don’t have to have exactly the same number or have an agreement based on the ability of each one to kill the other” (Robin Wright, Los Angeles Times, Dec. 11).

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United States:  Officials Debate Purchasing New B-2s

A proposal from Northrop Grumman to build several new B-2 stealth bombers has reignited the debate among U.S. Defense Department officials over whether to purchase new bombers, officials said yesterday (see GSN, Oct. 18).

The Air Force refused the proposal—under which Northrop Grumman would reopen several plants in California and build 40 bombers over the next 10 years for $30 billion—when the company offered it last year, the New York Times reported.  B-2 proponents raised the issue again this year because Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is planning to submit the fiscal 2003 Defense Department budget by early January.  Rumsfeld has said he wants to use the budget to resolve disputes over new weapon programs.

Rumsfeld has been an advocate for new B-2s in the past, according to the Times.  In 1995, he and several other former defense secretaries signed a letter pressing the Clinton administration to buy more of the bombers.  Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz has also been an advocate of the B-2 and might be willing to purchase more if a strong argument can be made, according to sources involved in the debate.

B-2 advocates point to a need for more long-range aircraft demonstrated by the lack of short-range fighter airbases in Central Asia during the war in Afghanistan.

“Air Force strike fighters played a small role in the Afghan war,” said one B-2 advocate.  “Yet the Air Force is scheduled to buy 2,200 short-range tactical aircraft in the coming decades, and zero bombers.  For some of us, their portfolio seems unbalanced.”

Air Force Opposition 

The Air Force, however, opposes the plan to purchase additional B-2 bombers.  One main reason is that allocating money for new B-2s would draw funds away from other weapons programs, including the high-priority F-22 Raptor stealth fighter jet, according to the Times.  Air Force Secretary James Roche, a former Northrop executive, has expressed opposition to the proposal (see GSN, Oct. 25).

New upgrades to existing B-52 and B-1 bombers, which allow forces to drop guided munitions, have reduced the need for more B-2s, according to senior Air Force officers.  “I think we’ve proven that we’ve got not only the right airplanes but pretty much the right mix,” said Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. John Jumper (Dao/Schmitt, New York Times, Dec. 11).

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North Korea:  KEDO Project Cost Could Double

The overall cost of building two light-water reactors in North Korea will grow to double the original estimated cost of $4.6 billion, former Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization General Counsel Mitchell Reiss said yesterday.

There already is a disparity of 8 percent between KEDO’s payable and receivable accounts from its member countries, Reiss said.  Additionally, North Korea has asked for compensation due to delays in the project (see GSN, Dec. 4).

“KEDO was a challenge from the beginning, and it’s easy to focus just on the problems, but there have also been a lot of achievements,” Reiss said (Seo Soo-min, Korea Times, Dec. 12).

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U.S.-Russia I:  Senate Restores Nunn-Lugar Funding

By Kerry Boyd

Global Security Newswire

The U.S. Senate added $46 million to funding for the Cooperative Threat Reduction program this weekend, overriding a cut made by the Appropriations Committee and restoring the program to the funding level requested by the Bush administration.  The program provides assistance to dismantle and secure former Soviet facilities and weapons of mass destruction.

In an amendment offered by Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), the Senate restored the funding as part of the fiscal 2002 Defense Appropriations Act.  The appropriations bill will now go to a House-Senate conference.  The House of Representatives approved its version of the bill Nov. 28.

Restoring the funds was “clearly the right thing to do,” said Steve LaMontagne of the Council for a Livable World Education Fund.  “It’s an important program for responding to the threats posed by terrorists acquiring weapons of mass destruction, and it’s a step back in the right direction.  Hopefully these programs will be expanded and refined and better funded in 2003.”

If approved by Congress and the president, the $46 million amendment would bring the total funding for the program in fiscal 2002 to $403 million, less than the $443 million budget for fiscal 2001, according to LaMontagne, who added the measure was unlikely to face serious opposition in the House-Senate conference.

The Senate Appropriations Committee had originally recommended a $46 million reduction from the program due to “important delays which have led to large unobligated balances,” according to the Appropriations Committee report.  “Total unobligated balances available to the Cooperative Threat Reduction program exceed $700,000,000,” the report said.

Unspent balances—funds allocated in the previous year that had not been spent—are in the nature of programs that involve contracting overseas, said Jon Wolfsthal of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.  The United States employs contractors abroad and pays them after their work is completed, so unspent balances do not necessarily indicate a lack of activity, he said, adding that the committee’s cuts in the program were “irresponsible,” given the threat of terrorism.

$226 Million Added for DOE Nonproliferation Programs in Russia

The Senate also included $226 million for Energy Department nonproliferation programs in Russia in its $20 billion emergency supplemental bill attached to the defense appropriations bill (see related GSN story, today). 

The funds were approved after the Senate rejected a proposal by Senator Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) to add $286 million for Energy nonproliferation programs in Russia to the defense appropriations bill.

The Cooperative Threat Reduction program has so far helped separate 5,700 Russian nuclear warheads from missiles; dismantled many warheads and safely stored the fissile material; collected and stored over 30,000 tactical nuclear weapons and provided peaceful employment for thousands of Russian nuclear scientists (see GSN, Nov. 19), Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) said in a Washington Post editorial yesterday.  Lugar suggested the United States should expand the Nunn-Lugar program to other countries where possible.

The program could also play a key role in implementing potential agreements between Russia and the United States to reduce their nuclear stockpiles (see GSN, Nov. 14), so Congress and the White House should actually expand the program in anticipation of its future role, LaMontagne said.

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U.S.-Russia II:  Nuclear Reductions Near Codification

A U.S.-Russian agreement on reducing nuclear weapons is “just about done,” U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said yesterday en route to Moscow for meetings today with Russian President Vladimir Putin (see GSN, Nov. 28).

“All we have to do is hear a number from them and then talk through the verification and other issues,” Powell said, referring to Russia’s announced intention to indicate the number of nuclear weapons that it plans to reduce.

In November, U.S. President George W. Bush announced that the United States would reduce to between 1,700 and 2,200 deployed strategic warheads in the next 10 years (see GSN, Nov. 14).  At that time, Bush expressed reluctance to codify the announced reductions, but said, “if we need to write it down on a piece of paper, I’ll be glad to do that.”

Yesterday, a senior U.S. State Department official said, “we’re willing to do this in written form,” but added, “not necessarily a treaty.”

The agreement would probably include measures established in the first and second Strategic Arms Reduction treaties, administration officials said.  “What we don’t want to lose is the verification and notifications and other provisions of START I and some of the provisions of START II,” Powell said yesterday.  “What we will be discussing is how to bring these features forward and to codify them, formalize them [in] a document in a way that both sides find satisfactory” (Alan Sipress, Washington Post, Dec. 10).

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Smuggling:  Uranium in Bust Not Weapon-Grade

The uranium seized during the arrest of six Russian would-be smugglers was not weapon-grade, officials said Saturday (see GSN, Dec. 7).

“As far as we know, it is not weapons-grade, not highly enriched uranium,” said Russian Atomic Ministry spokesman Yuri Bespalko.  The uranium is only “tablets of nuclear fuel not more than 4 percent enriched,” Bespalko said.  “It is not dangerous for humans.”  Uranium must be 80 percent enriched before it can be used in a nuclear weapon, according to the Wall Street Journal.

There was “no evidence” that a terrorist group was trying to buy the uranium, said Interior Ministry spokesman Oleg Yelnikov.   He said that the attempted sale, for a price of $30,000, was amateurish.  “If this had been the sale of material for nuclear weapons… it would have cost hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars,” Yelnikov said (Jeanne Whalen, Wall Street Journal, Dec. 10).

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Pakistan:  Suspicion Falls on Two Scientists

Suleiman Asad and Mohammed Ali Mukhtar, two Pakistani scientists with experience working at secret nuclear facilities, have emerged as the latest focus in investigations into the possibility that Pakistani scientists assisted al-Qaeda or the Taliban in developing weapons of mass destruction capability, according to yesterday’s New York Times. 

The United States has asked Pakistani authorities to question Asad and Mukhtar, according to Pakistani reports.  The two scientists were unavailable for questioning, Pakistani officials said, because they were working on a research project in Myanmar and were not expected to return in the near future.  A spokesman said Pakistan’s Atomic Energy Commission did not want to interrupt the scientists’ work.  Other reports said that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf had asked Myanmar to provide temporary asylum to the two scientists after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States (see GSN, Nov. 26).

In the last several weeks, Pakistani authorities have questioned several scientists, including two nuclear scientists—Sultan Bashiru-din Mehmood and Chaudry Abdul Majid—concerning their contacts with al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders (see GSN, Dec. 6).  None of the scientists had experience producing actual nuclear weapons, said U.S. officials.  Without such knowledge, they were not likely to have been useful to potential terrorists.  “If [al-Qaeda] had been handed the plans for a nuclear bomb, the worst they could have done is use them as kindling to start a fire,” said a U.S. official.

One of the two scientists, however, said during interrogation that he knew a Pakistani who had close contact with the Taliban, and U.S. officials thought the man was a weapons expert who was assisting the Taliban, said a U.S. official  (David Sanger, New York Times, Dec. 9).

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China: Nuclear Weapon Development Continues

China has been conducting nuclear weapon-related tests in recent months at its Lop Nur nuclear test site, according to U.S. intelligence agencies, the Washington Times reported Friday.  The tests are part of China’s effort to develop warheads for new ballistic missiles based on land and on submarines (see GSN, Nov.13), according to the Times.

The most recent test, in November, produced no detectable nuclear yield or blast, according to officials.  China conducted three additional tests in June and July, according to classified intelligence reports in July (Gertz/Scarborough, Washington Times, Dec. 7).

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North Korea:  U.S. Should Get Tough, Experts Say

The United States needs to take a tougher approach with North Korea in regard to nuclear inspections, wrote Henry Sokolski and Victor Gilinsky in today’s National Review Online.

North Korea’s recent decision to allow inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency to visit a nuclear research facility is a minor effort at best, according to Sokolski, the director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, and Gilinsky, an energy consultant and former U.S. nuclear regulatory commissioner.

“Never mind that the facility is so benign and minor it does not require international nuclear inspections—or that Pyongyang is allowing it only to be ‘visited’ rather than examined,” they said.

Sokolski and Gilinsky praised U.S. President George W. Bush for cracking down on the North on the issue of nuclear inspections.  This is especially vital now, because the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) is preparing to start construction on two nuclear power plants in North Korea, they said.

The North cannot get the essential nuclear equipment, however, until the IAEA can make sure North Korea is no longer attempting to build nuclear weapons.  The inspection process is expected to take at least three years after full access is allowed to North Korea’s nuclear sites, according to the IAEA.  “In other words, North Korea needs to open up to IAEA inspectors now to comply with the 1994 [nuclear power plant] deal,” the authors said. 

North Korea “will come into full compliance” with the IAEA when a “substantial portion” of the reactor deal is finished—the point the project is now expected to reach in three years.  North Korea argues with this definition, saying instead that “substantial portion” is defined only as when they have to talk about inspections.  “That doesn’t sound like the response of someone with nothing to hide,” Sokolski and Gilinsky wrote.

North Korea’s refusal to comply with IAEA inspections also brings it into violation of the deal it signed with KEDO, which stated that all parties to the reactors’ construction must abide the inspection requirements in the 1994 deal.  “KEDO’s way around this has been simply to ignore the requirement,” Sokolski and Gilinsky wrote, “and hope nobody notices.”

“All this suggests the need for a tougher approach to securing North Korea’s compliance with its Nonproliferation Treaty requirements,” wrote Sokolski and Gilinsky.  “What’s needed—and what President Bush is now calling for—is far more than what Pyongyang is offering” (Sokolski/Gilinsky, National Review, Dec. 10).

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