China’s Nuclear-Power Chief: A Spy?

[kristopher]

China’s Nuclear-Power Chief: A Spy?
Posted by Evan Osnos

When Kang Rixin, the head of China’s nuclear-power program, was sentenced to life in prison last November for taking bribes, it was a troubling enough piece of news. Given the speed, scale, and ambition of China’s nuclear program—it has more plants in the planning stage than the rest of the world combined—it did not project reassuring evidence that China has shielded this crucial program from the kind of construction-corruption that has dogged the high-speed rail system.

Today brought startling news. Midway through a video leaked on the Chinese Web, a senior military official explains previously unknown details about major spying cases uncovered in recent years, including the fact that bribery was hardly the most serious accusation against Kang. He is accused of selling secrets about China’s nuclear power industry to foreign countries. “Kang’s case can’t be made public because the damage he has done by selling secrets was a lot more devastating than economic losses,” Major General Jin Yinan said in the video.

If true, it would make Kang one of China’s highest-ranking figures to be accused of spying. (Before his downfall, he was a member of the Communist Party’s elite Central Committee and the Central Disciplinary Committee.) Before we start conjuring images of a Chinese A. Q. Khan, it’s worth remembering that Kang had no (known) involvement with the weapons programs, and that selling secrets is a flexible notion in China; accusations that might lead to charges of simple bribery one day can be upgraded to divulging “business secrets” the next.

...Related: The Guardian is reporting this week that a leaked U.S. cable out of Beijing says that China “has ‘vastly increased’ the risk of a nuclear accident by opting for cheap technology that will be 100 years old by the time dozens of its reactors reach the end of their lifespans.”

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/evanosnos/2011/08/chinas-nuclear-power-chief-a-spy.html

[kristopher]

1. US State Dept: "China is vastly increasing the aggregate risk of its nuclear power fleet"

This article was linked in the OP.

Is China's nuclear power risky?
Aug. 29, 2011 at 1:04 PM

BEIJING, Aug. 29 (UPI) -- By settling for cheap technology, China has "vastly increased" the risk of a nuclear accident, claim diplomatic cables from the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, The Guardian newspaper reports.

The U.S. Embassy cables from August 2008, released by WikiLeaks, warned that China's choice of technology would be a century old by the time dozens of China's reactors come to the end of their lifespan.

In one of the August 2008 cables, the embassy suggested "continuous high-level advocacy" on behalf of Westinghouse to push its AP-1000 reactor, noting that China was in the process of building 50-60 new nuclear plants by 2020, the newspaper reports. At that time, China was keen on building its CPR-1000 reactors, based on old Westinghouse technology.

Choosing CPR-100 rather than building a fleet of state-of-the art reactors, one cable warned, China would be burdened with technology that, by the end of its lifetime, will be 100 years old.

"By bypassing the passive safety technology of the AP1000,...

http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Energy-Resources/2011/08/29/Is-Chinas-nuclear-power-risky/UPI-47291314637455/