G-8 to confirm export ban on nations not signing additional protocol

[papau]

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/index-e.htm

G-8 to confirm export ban on nations not signing additional protocol

Yomiuri Shimbun

Leaders of the Group of Eight major nations scheduled to meet next month for a summit meeting on Sea Island, Ga., will confirm the policy of prohibiting exports of nuclear power generating facilities to countries that have not signed the International Atomic Energy Agency's Additional Protocol, giving the international organization authority to conduct surprise inspections, a government source said Monday.

<snip>The Nuclear Suppliers Group, which comprises 40 countries including Japan, operates under a common guideline that the countries to which they export nuclear power reactors and spent fuel must agree to the IAEA's normal inspections and monitoring, based on the countries' voluntary nuclear reports submitted to the agency.

The group has endorsed Bush's proposal that the countries sign the IAEA additional protocol, which allows the IAEA to conduct inspections only two hours after announcing an inspection, aimed at making the inspections more thorough. <snip>

Japan has insisted that countries should not only sign the Additional Protocol but also ratify it

[NNadir]

1. Inspections of nuclear plants by international agencies is a critical

part of the effort to get nuclear power growing as fast as it needs to to save the earth. From my perspective, the proliferation risk, although small, represents the greatest risk from the expansion of nuclear energy. It is absolutely essential to denature weapons grade plutonium by running it at least once through a power reactor, to recycle the rest of the reactor grad Plutonium in the presence of Neptunium to further complicate it's isotopic mix, and to fission as much as is possible to reduce inventories to an easier to control number.

It is more important however to have internation observers stationed full time at enrichment plants and at reprocessing plants. It would be better overall to severely limit enrichment plants, replacing the need for them by embracing the Thorium fuel cycle.

[papau]

2. 20,000 tons we have given away we now want accounted for - it

will be interesting to see if they get anything close to that amount accounted for and put under lock and key

ideal for "dirty" bomb since fright is the idea - not damage - and one can handle this stuff for a reasonable amount of time without killing yourself.