Nuclear Policy News – March 9, 2010

FISSILE MATERIAL
For Iran, Enriching Uranium Only Gets Easier
NYT by William J. Broad

Russia sees new nuclear arms treaty by April
AP

Japan-U.S. secret pacts confirmed, gov't policy shift expected
Mainichi Daily

Russia says ready to establish nuclear fuel bank by yearend
RIA Novosti

EAST ASIA
1. Japan-U.S. secret pacts confirmed, gov't policy shift expected
Mainichi Daily
A Foreign Ministry panel concluded Tuesday that secret pacts on nuclear arms and other issues were reached by Japan and the United States in the Cold War era, leading the Japanese government to end its decades-long official denial of their existence.

2. Report: NKorea has medium-range missile division
AP by Hyung-Jin Kim
North Korea has recently created an army division in charge of newly developed intermediate-range missiles capable of striking U.S. forces in Japan and Guam, a South Korean news agency said Tuesday.

3. N.Korea says ready for both dialogue and war with US
AFP
North Korea said Tuesday it would strengthen its nuclear deterrent in response to US military threats and is prepared for both dialogue and war with Washington.

MIDDLE EAST
4. For Iran, Enriching Uranium Only Gets Easier
NYT by William J. Broad
In the Iranian desert, at a sprawling industrial site ringed by barbed wire and antiaircraft guns, a shift in the enrichment of uranium is producing global jitters because it could shorten Iran’s path to the acquisition of nuclear weapons.

5. Iran says hopes China won't bow to sanctions pressure
Reuters
Iran said on Tuesday it hoped China would not give in to pressure to agree to new sanctions that the United States and its allies hope to win U.N. approval for over its nuclear programme.

6. Blacklisting of Iranian Central Bank Might be Ruled Out
GSN
The United States and three of its Western allies have dropped a proposal to prohibit business with Iran's central bank as part of a potential fourth U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution aimed at resolving the nuclear standoff with the Middle Eastern state, Reuters reported Friday (see GSN, March 5).

7. Israel weighing construction of nuclear power plant
Reuters by Ari Rabinovitch and Crispian Balmer
Israel will this week unveil plans to produce nuclear-generated electricity, officials said on Monday, a move that could draw fresh international attention toward its assumed atomic arsenal.

8. Biden assures Israel of U.S. security commitment
Reuters by Adam Entous and Jeffrey Heller
U.S. Vice President Joe Biden assured Israel Tuesday of Washington's commitment to its security and preventing Iran from producing nuclear weapons.

SOUTH ASIA

RUSSIA/FSU/EUROPE
9. Russia sees new nuclear arms treaty by April
AP
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says a new treaty limiting U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear arsenals could be signed within two or three weeks.

10. US, Russia resume nuclear arms talks in Geneva
AP by Bradley S. Klapper
American and Russian negotiators resumed talks Tuesday to reduce their nuclear weapons arsenals in the latest attempt to find a successor deal to the expired 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty.

11. Nuclear energy gets new French-driven boost
AP by Greg Keller and Angela Charlton
Poor countries need nuclear power, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Monday, urging rich lenders to help pay for a global nuclear expansion in the interests of fighting climate change and feeding the growing world hunger for energy.

MULTILATERAL ARMS CONTROL AND NONPROLIFERATION
12. Russia says ready to establish nuclear fuel bank by yearend
RIA Novosti
Russia will provide by the end of 2010 the first batch of low-enriched uranium for an international nuclear fuel reserve bank under control of the UN nuclear watchdog, the head of Russia's state-run nuclear power corporation Rosatom said.

13. U.N. Head Calls For Productive Nuclear Treaty Meeting
GSN
The secretary general of the United Nations on Friday said he hoped for a productive Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty review conference in May, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, Feb. 23).

14. Science, Technology Crucial to Nuclear Disarmament, Report Says
GSN
A new report from the American Physical Society urges the Obama administration to take steps that would enable science and technology to better support the U.S. goals of nonproliferation and nuclear disarmament (see GSN, Feb. 3).

U.S. NUCLEAR WEAPONS STRATEGY AND POLICY

OPINIONS
15. No need to ban the bomb
LA Times by Francis J. Gavin
Iran's announcement last month that it will begin enriching uranium for use in a medical reactor sparked a rare bipartisan consensus in Washington. Politicians on both sides of the aisle treated the news as the latest evidence we are moving closer to a nuclear crisis.

16. The Qom Enrichment Facility: Was Iran Legally Bound to Disclose?
Jurist by Daniel Joyner
Since Iran’s disclosure of the existence of its intended uranium enrichment facility at Qom in September 2009, one of the points of debate among international observers has been whether in the timing of this disclosure, Iran violated its obligations under its legal agreements with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

17. Pakistan against signing the NPT as a non-nuclear weapons state
Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses by Ch. Viyyanna Sastry
There appears to be a fundamental shift in the Pakistani position on the global nuclear non-proliferation regime, to which it had been chained for more than three decades. Simultaneously, Pakistan has made known that its reliance on nuclear weapons has increased and it would keep increasing its weapons number.