Nuclear Review to Make "Progress" in Advancing Obama Disarmament Vision, Official Says

WASHINGTON -- Thursday, July 23, 2009. A major nuclear weapons review under way at the Defense Department should result in "progress" toward implementing U.S. President Barack Obama's long-term vision for disarmament, a senior Pentagon official said today.

"The vision is clear and I think progress will be made," Michael Vickers, who advises Defense Secretary Robert Gates on strategic capabilities and operations, told reporters at a Defense Writers Group breakfast.
The Pentagon is leading the congressionally mandated Nuclear Posture Review, a sweeping assessment of nuclear strategy, forces and operations that is to conclude by the end of the year.
In an April speech in Prague, Obama pledged that "the United States will take concrete steps towards a world without nuclear weapons." He called the "existence of thousands of nuclear weapons" the "most dangerous legacy of the Cold War," vowing to launch negotiations with Moscow to take reductions in force levels. More >>>

Global Environmental Change and Human Security Conference

More than 150 experts from around the world are assembled this week in Oslo, Norway, for the capstone conference of the Global Environmental Change and Human Security (GECHS) Project.

Monday, July 20, 2009 - Indian and U.S. officials are set tomorrow to discuss arrangements under which New Delhi could reprocess nuclear fuel purchased from the United States, the Indo-Asian News Service reported

India would use a facility within its borders to reprocess spent fuel, an effort that can generate nuclear-weapon material. The site would operate under monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency, under the terms of the U.S.-Indian nuclear trade deal.
New Delhi might also today identify locations today for two civilian nuclear facilities that the United States plans to build. Anticipated locations are in the states of Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh, sources indicated (Indo-Asian News Service I/Hindustan Times, July 19). More >>>

Bin Laden deputy warns Pakistan the US wants to seize its nuclear arsenal

Zawahiri tries to halt slide in support for al-Qaida in country by playing on fears that Washington is orchestrating violence

Wednesday 15 July 2009 - Osama bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has attempted to halt al-Qaida's plunging popularity in Pakistan by exploiting widely held fears that the US is plotting to seize the country's nuclear bombs.
In an audio message released today Zawahiri warned Pakistanis that the US was striving to "break up this nuclear-capable country and transform it into tiny fragments, loyal to and dependent on the neo-crusaders".
"The only hope to save Pakistan from this disastrous fate is jihad," said Zawahiri who, along with Bin Laden, is believed to be sheltering in the tribal belt along the Afghan border. He called on Pakistanis to band together and form a "citadel of Islam" on the subcontinent. More >>>

The planet's future: Climate change 'will cause civilisation to collapse'

14 July, 2009 - An effort on the scale of the Apollo mission that sent men to the Moon is needed if humanity is to have a fighting chance of surviving the ravages of climate change. The stakes are high, as, without sustainable growth, "billions of people will be condemned to poverty and much of civilization will collapse".

This is the stark warning from the biggest single report to look at the future of the planet - obtained by The Independent on Sunday ahead of its official publication next month. Backed by a diverse range of leading organizations such as UNESCO, the World Bank, the US army and the Rockefeller Foundation, the 2009 State of the Future report runs to 6,700 pages and draws on contributions from 2,700 experts around the globe. Its findings are described by Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the UN, as providing "invaluable insights into the future for the United Nations, its member states, and civil society". More >>>
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The geopolitical consequences of climate change

Sunday, July 5, 2009 - VENICE -- Europe will be wrangled for the next six months by a lanky, no-nonsense Swede named Carl Bildt. His country chairs this semester's cascade of European Union summits, procedural debates and other gabfests. As Sweden's foreign minister, it is Bildt's job to make sense of it all -- a task akin to herding not cats but eels.

Well, he asked for it, didn't he? When he was Sweden's prime minister in the 1990s, the conservative politician relentlessly overhauled his country's socialist economic policies and neutralist orientation to push it into the European Union. Now Sweden is stuck picking up the pieces of a deepening European economic crisis, paralyzed national governments and a constitutional stalemate.
But it was Bildt's description of the strategic consequences of climate change that galvanized my attention when he spoke here to the Council for the United States and Italy. The rapid melting of the Arctic ice sheet at the North Pole will bring "revolutionary new transport possibilities between the Atlantic and the Pacific," he told the gathering, expanding that thought for me later in an interview. More >>>

Planned shredding of nuclear papers "illegal"

Switzerland -June 30, 2009 A parliamentary control delegation has rejected plans by the cabinet to destroy sensitive documents related to an international nuclear smuggling ring.

The committee called on the government to seek an acceptable solution with justice authorities for about 100 pages of evidence linked to an investigation of three Swiss engineers suspected of smuggling nuclear weapons technology.

"There is no international obligation to destroy the documents," said Hansruedi Stadler, a Christian Democratic senator, on Tuesday.

The committee said the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) agreed that Switzerland was capable of safely storing the file, which contains more than 1,000 pages including documents on bomb designs, until a court rules on the case of Urs Tinner, his brother Marco and their father Friedrich. More >>>