CND Press Roundup Thursday 28th July 2022

War in Ukraine / NATO

• Russia has captured Ukraine’s second-largest nuclear power plant, an adviser to Ukraine’s president has confirmed. Oleksiy Arestovych said the takeover of the Vuhlehirska plant, located in the eastern Donetsk region, was only a “tiny tactical advantage” for Moscow but had freed up Russian troops for a “massive redeployment” to the southern regions where Ukrainian troops are mounting a counter-offensive.

• Britain’s national security tsar has warned that a communication breakdown between NATO, Russia, and China, risks the initiation of a nuclear war. Speaking at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, Sir Stephen Lovegrove said: “The cold war’s two monolithic blocks of the USSR and Nato – though not without alarming bumps – were able to reach a shared understanding of doctrine that is today absent,” he said. “Doctrine is opaque in Moscow and Beijing, let alone Pyongyang or Tehran.” The comments were reported by The Guardian, The Times, The Telegraph, and Al Jazeera.

Trident

• Some coverage of the latest nuclear convoy spotted by NukeWatch in The National, The Star, and The Daily Express.

UK Nuclear Energy

• All ain’t well within the Conservative government over the Sizewell C planning decision, as Suffolk Coast MP and DWP Secretary Thérèse Coffey took the issue up with colleague Kwasi Kwarteng. In a letter to the Business Secretary, Coffee noted “her surprise” at the decision despite it going against the recommendations of the independent Planning Inspectorate. She added that she expects the decision to be subject to a judicial review at the High Court. In its report on the planning application for Sizewell C, the PI said the project should not go ahead until a regular water supply to the plant had been secured, and concerns over the destruction of nearby ecosystems had been addressed. None of these conditions were met at the time of the Kwarteng’s approval.

• Meanwhile, author and Suffolk resident William Atkins writes an opinion in The Guardian on the matter of Sizewell C’s water supply, or lack thereof. On the planning examination process last year her writes: “Last September, during the closing hearings of the six-month public planning examination, the question of just where the developer was going to get the water to run Sizewell C, let alone build it, was becoming urgent. Those who had raised concerns about precisely this issue more than 10 years earlier would have been forgiven for feeling frustrated. As one of the driest parts of the country, Suffolk is described by the Environment Agency as ‘seriously water stressed’. By 2043, eight years into Sizewell C’s 60-year operating life, the agency anticipates a water deficit in the county of more than 7m litres a day. Northumbrian Water, which operates locally as Essex and Suffolk Water, had made it clear to EDF that there was not enough local groundwater for either construction or operation. EDF’s plan, therefore, was to build a pipeline to bring water from the River Waveney, 18 miles away on the Norfolk border. During at least the first two years of construction, while the pipeline was being built, EDF planned to install a temporary desalination plant on the site to turn saltwater from the sea into fresh.”

• The Derby Telegraph reports on the “race against time” to build a skills hub that will train apprentices to fuel Rolls Royce’s nuclear plan for Britain. However, the plan is getting held up by Derby City Council.

NPT / TPNW

• Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon writes in Foreign Policy magazine calling for the upcoming NPT review conference to be the place where world leaders reaffirm their commitment to nuclear disarmament. On the argument circulated by the nuclear powers and NATO – that the TPNW isn’t needed as the NPT gives a path to disarmament – he writes: “Nuclear states should follow through on those arguments by making the first NPT Review Conference in seven years a success. If they do not, their claims ring hollow, since they would be doing little to present any credible alternative to the TPNW to advance disarmament and would instead be making plans for maintaining or increasing their nuclear arsenals for decades to come. If nuclear states want to be taken seriously, they need to respond with the same energy and purpose as the TPNW states in advancing arms control and disarmament. This requires, at a minimum, that nuclear states make a commitment to start a sustained dialogue aimed at reducing current nuclear risks and get serious about developing a broader arms control framework that could make meaningful progress in tackling the existential nuclear threat. The NPT is a precious achievement that was painstakingly negotiated at a time of grave international tensions. It has endured for more than half a century with almost universal international support, but it must not be taken for granted. P5 states need to step up at the review conference and show the world they are serious about peace and disarmament. The alternative of an ever-escalating arms race could be a betrayal of all humanity.”

North Korea

• North Korea’s Kim Jong-un used his speech to mark the 69th anniversary of the Korean armistice to blast his new South Korean counterpart for the first time – and to announce that his country’s “nuclear war deterrence” is “fully ready to mobilise.” Labelling the administration of Yoon Suk-yeol as “warmongers” and “disgusting thugs,” Kim also accused the South of pushing the peninsula towards war with its “toadyish, treacherous acts.” In response, Yoon’s office said they regretted the remarks and urged Kim to “take the path of dialogue to achieve substantive denuclearisation and peace.” Tensions between the two countries have been rising in recent months – with Pyongyang ramping up its ballistic missile and nuclear [programmes, while South Korea’s Yoon affirming his support for the Kill Chain strategy – a plan to preemptively strike North Korean targets and senior leaders if a nuclear attack is expected.

Iran Nuclear Deal

• Former Israeli PM Ehud Barak writes for Time saying Iran is 17 days away from becoming a threshold nuclear state. Barak writes that it is now too late for the US and Israel to develop a military plan to delay Iran’s nuclear programme as it did with Syria and Iraq – something he said may have been possible at the time Donald Trump pulled out of the 2015 deal. For Barak, diplomacy with the threat of force seems the only way: “The US can still deter Iran from going nuclear by a diplomatic ultimatum to stop the program, backed by credible threat of a wide scale war. Nothing short of that can assure a result. I hope this is still realistic.”

• Meanwhile, Iran’s deputy permanent representative to the UN accused Israel of threatening regional states with nuclear annihilation. “The Security Council’s inaction has emboldened the Israeli regime to continue its crimes against the oppressed Palestinian people as well as its aggressions and malicious activities against the regional countries. The lack of accountability for such serious violations contributes to this impunity,” Zahra Ershadi added.

Fukushima

• The Japan Times covers the launch on Wednesday by Japan’s Fumio Kishida, of a “green transformation” panel that looks to tackle climate change and ensure energy security. The paper notes that the panel is part of efforts by Kishida to return nuclear energy to the fold as a major part of the country’s energy mix – after a decade of moving away from nuclear following the 2011 Fukushima disaster.

CND

• Another example of The Telegraph making weird references to CND in this parliamentary sketch looking at the legacy of the 2012 London Olympics. On the Danny Boyle directed opening ceremony, Madeline Grant writes: “Later on, a group of synchronised dancers stood together to form the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament logo. This hasn’t aged too well either; especially now that Russia has invaded one of the two European countries that did unilaterally discard their nuclear weapons. The other (Belarus) has become a Russian satellite state. Greenham Common was never just a bit of cuddly cosplay. Shami Chakrabarti was there too, in her pre-Corbyn days, selected by Boyle as one of the eight Olympic flag-bearers. ‘We salute her integrity,’ chimed the voice-over.”