CND Press Digest: Tuesday 11th June 2024

Nukes in Britain

• Letters to the Guardian responding to Labour’s nuclear weapons commitment and Jeremy Corbyn’s recent opinion piece on nuclear weapons and national security.
• The Ferret: Alarm over 174 security breaches at Clyde nuclear bases. Two nuclear bomb bases on the Clyde recorded 174 security breaches over five years, according to information released by the Ministry of Defence (MoD).

Global Nukes

• YouGov: Half of Americans believe that no country should possess nuclear weapons. Younger Americans are more inclined to view nuclear weapons as promoting safety and are more supportive of preemptive nuclear attacks compared to older generations.
• Politico: Belarus and Russia to conduct joint nuclear drills. Belarus said the exercises are necessary due to some Western countries’ “plans to use military force against our state.”

UK Nuclear Power

• New Civil Engineer: Great British Nuclear SMR competition timeline delayed for General Election.
• Confidential talks are now moving at pace to site some of the first new Rolls-Royce small, medium nuclear reactors or SMRs to Gloucestershire.
• Herald: A union has urged ministers to end its opposition to nuclear energy after a warning that the nation is “returning to the days of power cuts and candles” as hundreds of skilled Scots are already leaving to go abroad because of its decline. The GMB union is concerned that the opposition is risking stalling Scotland’s drive to net zero and the potential to create thousands of new jobs through nuclear power.

Nuclear Power

• The Guardian: Peter Dutton’s plans will breach the Paris agreement on climate – that much is clear.
• Renew Economy: Dutton’s nuclear plan wouldn’t even meet net zero by 2050 target, report finds.
• UK condemns Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure as nuclear safety ‘compromised’. The situation at Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Zaporizhizhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) “remains extremely fragile” and the UN should “reject, categorically, Russia’s deliberate and illegal assault on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure” according to two British ambassadors.

NATO / Europe

• European Leadership Network: Nuclear failsafe review. At a time of heightened great power competition, increasing threats of nuclear weapons use, and rapid developments in emerging disruptive technologies, the risk of inadvertent use of nuclear weapons is high. Unilateral failsafe reviews are the single best prospect for nuclear risk reduction today.  
• Luftwaffe’s nuclear-capable F-35s enter production in late 2024. Germany’s F-35s are set to be dual-capable, carrying both conventional and nuclear weapons, with production kicking off at the end of this year, according to JR McDonald, Lockheed’s VP of F-35 business development. The assembly of the forward bulkhead section is scheduled to begin in November or December.

Middle East & North Africa

• Washington Institute: IAEA censure risks Iranian escalation.
• Press TV: Iran’s interim foreign minister says a politically-motivated resolution issued by the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will fail to impede efforts by the Islamic Republic to implement its nuclear development plans.

AUKUS / Indo-Pacific

• Crikey!: A Starmer government wouldn’t get in the way of AUKUS. The UK has too much money on the line. Keir Starmer would be stupid to oppose AUKUS, given how much money Australia is paying the UK to make nuclear reactors for the submarines.
• NZ Herald: AUKUS and security on the agenda as Chinese Premier Li Qiang visits New Zealand

Best,

Pádraig McCarrick

Press and Communications Officer

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament