Nuclear news – Week One of 2021 – Australia and more

“News” is by its nature , all about the bad stuff, while the majority of people, trying to live a decent, co-operative, life, are not reported. No surprise the, that 2020 news has been all about the bad stuff.

And bad it has been, and still is, with world-wide coronavirus cases heading to 90 million, and economic disruption resulting from the situation. At the same time, global heating moves on inexorably, with polar ice melting changing the world ecosystem.

The pandemic and global heating have been, still are, the defining problems of our time.  BUT, the nuclear danger is equally important, and it is the one that could be addressed, if the deceptive propaganda of the nuclear industry were to be countered. The industry has done a great job of keeping its issues out of the public eye, with its subtle theme that only technical experts can have an opinion.

That’s why, reluctantly, I decided to concentrate on nuclear issues, and leave those other critical topics to the media.

This month is especially important, with the coming into force of the U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, on January 22.  There will be voices rubbishing this Treaty. But it complements existing agreements, and most significantly it will make nuclear weapons look, (like chemical and biological ones), unacceptable and immoral as well as illegal 

Some bits of good news  -Amid 2020’s gloom, there are reasons to be hopeful about the climate in 2021.

What went right in 2020:  some big wins for the environment, society and culture, human rights, even health.

AUSTRALIA.

The Australian government’s shameful record in the Kimba nuclear dump fiasco.

The decay of mainstream media in Australia – and the rise of new independent media.  Rupert Murdoch’s News Corpse rises in ABC Insiders .

INTERNATIONAL

Legal case on extradition of Julian Assange is an alarming precedent for freedom of speech.

Pandemic, climate, nuclear weapons – lessons for survival in 2021.This is the sort of letter that citizens need to be writing – in support of the nuclear weapons ban.

Mary Olson on the 6 mentors who guided her on gender and radiation study.

The Nuclear Industry’s Really Bad Safety Analysis.

How the USA and Soviet Union planned to use nuclear radiation as a weapon.

Get ready for a 2021 barrage of pro nuclear spin, from a desperate industry.

JAPAN. Fukushima nuclear clean-up hugely affected by discovery of lethal radiation levels.   Tokyo Olympics Impossible.  Never give up! 95 year old Hibakusha welcomes the UN nuclear ban treaty.  In March 2011 Japan’s government considered evacuating the then Emperor Akihito further away from Fukushima.

USA.

• Donald Trump left a hawkish nuclear weapons mess, but  Joe Biden can make a lot of improvements, on his own.  USA show of force -flying nuclear bombers over Iran.  Joe Biden reported to be considering cuts to America’s $1.2trillion nuclear modernization program.

Plowshare anti nuclear-weapons activists again face prison . Joe Biden must end the cover-up of, and the huge money to, Israel’s nuclear weapons.  Nuclear Command and Control: Session 3 of the Congressional Study Group.  LGBTQ Activists Jump Into the Atlantic to upport Treaty banning nuclear weapons.  Biden Wants US Back in Iran Nuclear Deal (Video).

Doubtful that aging Los Alamos National Laboratory could safely produce plutonium triggers, no matter how much funding it gets.

•   Avril Haines is unfit for Director of National Intelligence, with her history of coverup of tortures.
• Never mind health spending: USA aims to be Topp in Space Race.
• Ohio Supreme Court stops collection of nuclear plant subsidy.
• Hanford’s dangerous collection of nuclear waste sites, including 177 underground leaky tanks.  USA is not facing up to the climate threats to its nuclear wastes.
• Extending the operating licences on nuclear reactors to 60, 80, 100 years – a recipe for disaster.
• The Shoshone Nation’s battle against nuclear racism and trespassers on indigenous land.
• Non violent anti-nuclear action – the Clamshell Alliance model for success.

UK. 

• Brexit: UK and Euratom have signed a Nuclear Cooperation Agreement (NCA).
• Scotland wants no part in the Tories’ latest nuclear energy folly.
• In so many ways, Sizewell C nuclear plan is a bad deal for Britain, and especially for climate action.  Cover-up! how consumers will be forced to pay for cost-overruns for Sizewell C nuclear construction.  Sisters, aged 9 and 11, plead to UK PM to save environment from Sixewell C nuclear project.
• New delay in planning decision for £16bn Wylfa nuclear development on Anglesey.  Bechtel, Westinghouse and Southern Company’s hopeless case to save shambolic Wylfa nuclear project.  With all the costs and delays – why not scrap the Wylfa nuclear project right now?
• Glenn Greenwald: Julian Assange’s Imprisonment Exposes U.S. Myths About Freedom.

POLAND.  Trump’s nuclear construction deal with Poland – strained with Biden victory ?

SOUTH KOREA.  South Korean government to cut nuclear power generation.

CANADA.  Small modular reactor plan – a dangerous distraction from climate change action.  The gigantic Chalk River Mound (the so-called ‘NSDF’) would not reduce Canada’s radioactive waste liabilities and could in fact increase them.

INDONESIA.  In Indonesia – small nuclear reactors as a prelude to nuclear weapons?

SLOVAKIA.  Slovakia: Krško nuclear power station shut down as a precaution after quake.

TURKEY.  Turkey’s aspirations to become a nuclear weapons power.

RUSSIA.  How a Soviet spy helped to avoid nuclear war.