CND Press Digest: Tuesday 18th June 2024

Nukes in Britain

• CND’s response to ICAN’s global nuclear weapons spending report.

Global Nukes

• Responsible Statecraft: World spending on nukes explodes to more than $90 billion. The question is, what benefits, your safety or big business?
• Al Jazeera: Watchdog warns reliance on nuclear weapons rising amid global tension.
• Morning Star: Nuclear powers are continuing to modernise their weapons, says Swedish think tank.
• Beyond Nuclear: From the Hiroshima bomb to Israel’s nuclear weapons, the path leads back to Congo’s uranium, writes Linda Pentz Gunter.

Future Warfare

• Reuters: NATO targets AI, robots and space tech in $1.1 billion fund. A consortium of NATO allies has confirmed the first tranche of companies awarded funding as part of the group’s one billion euro ($1.1 billion) innovation fund.

UK Nuclear Power

• Dave Tokes blog: Nuclear black hole could deal a knock-out blow to Labour’s renewable targets; Labour’s ambitious target for offshore wind could be quietly shelved to make way for the giant funding commitment to pay for Sizewell C nuclear power plant. Much of Labour’s manifesto commitments for clean energy, a state-owned ‘Great British Energy’ company to promote new technologies and funds to support buildings-based insulation and low carbon measures, have been widely flagged already. But there’s not much attention being given to two big, interlinked, threats to Labour’s clean energy strategy.
• The National: An SNP candidate has claimed money being raised from a windfall tax on oil and gas giants is being “wasted”. Drew Hendry, the SNP’s economy spokesperson in the last parliament, took aim at the Tories’ current approach to the tax as well as Labour’s plans for it. He blasted the Tories for using the money to fund their plans for tax cuts – and said Labour would “waste” it on new nuclear power plantsin England.

Nuclear Power

• Reuters: The US is as many as 15 years behind China on developing high-tech nuclear power as Beijing’s state-backed technology approach and extensive financing give it the edge, a report said on Monday.
• Having promised a nuclear power policy for several years, the Australian Liberal-National Party finally announced one: no reactors before 2040 and approving new gas and coal projects instead. At the same time, it is abandoning the emissions reduction target for 2030 (a 43 per cent cut compared with 2005 levels) and refusing to commit to details about nuclear projects until after the May 2025 election.

NATO / Europe

• The Guardian: Row as NATO chief hints at talks to increase availability of nuclear weapons. Jens Stoltenberg accused of ‘escalation of tension’ as he warns of growing threat from Russia and China.
• Reuters: Kremlin calls NATO chief’s nuclear weapons remark an ‘escalation of tension’.
• Politico: NATO should flex its nuclear muscles, Stoltenberg says.
• Financial Times: Mark Rutte offers deal to Viktor Orbán as he seeks to clinch Nato top job. Dutch PM holds talks with Hungarian counterpart in bid to end Budapest block on becoming alliance’s secretary-general.

AUKUS / Asia-Pacific

• Naval News: HII and Babcock launch new company H&B Defence to accelerate Australia’s nuclear-powered submarine program.
• The Strategist: Even with intended reforms, US defence trade rules threaten AUKUS cooperation.
• Think China: Why Japan is no closer to joining AUKUS. AUKUS, the Australia-UK-US alliance, is still far from admitting Japan as another member, not least because of cultural and security reasons, says Chinese academic Guo Bingyun.
• The Telegraph: China expanding nuclear arsenal ‘faster than any other country’. Bejing sparks alarm among Nato allies as it rapidly increases number of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Best,

Pádraig McCarrick

Press and Communications Officer

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament