CND Press Digest: Wednesday 14th August 2024

Posted: 14th August 2024

Nukes in Britain

  • Academic Paul Cornish has published an essay on Britain’s nuclear weapons, an updated version of a paper presented to the Labour Party International Policy Commission in May 2016.
  • i Newspaper: UK must ‘wake up’ to Russian threat after British sites appear on target list. ’An attack against Barrow, crippling our nuclear deterrent, is increasing in probability,’ says an ex-chair of the Defence Committee.
  • The Telegraph: Labour ‘to cut millions’ from budget for modernising Armed Forces. UK ‘risks falling further behind adversaries like China and Russia and peers like the US’, warns defence source.

Nuclear Testing

  • ITV asks: What happens after a nuclear power station stops making electricity?
  • NFLA: The NFLAs have welcomed recent developments to move towards an early Test of Public Support of the proposal to bring a Geological Disposal Facility to Theddlethorpe in East Lincolnshire. Nuclear Waste Services, a division of the taxpayer-funded Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, is seeking to identify a potential site for the GDF in West Cumbria or in Lincolnshire.
  • New Civil Engineer: Nuclear Waste Services (NWS) has awarded Graham Construction a four-year contract to build a 10m thick engineered cap over trenches and vaults at the Low Level Waste Repository (LLWR) in Cumbria.
  • North Wales Chronicle: An anti-nuclear group concerned over low level radioactive contamination at Trawsfynydd lake has blasted a recent government consultation as “too short, ill timed and clumsy.”

Nuclear Power

  • Energy Research & Social Science: Ensuring protection amidst threats to the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant in the Ukraine.
  • World Nuclear News: International Atomic Energy Agency staff have visited the site of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant’s cooling tower fire, but say they have “not been able to draw definitive conclusions on the basis of the findings and observations so far.”
  • Dr Ian Fairlie writes for the CND website: Fire at Zaporizhzhia elevates meltdown risk.
  • Mainichi: The operator of the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant plans to begin retrieving debris that contains melted nuclear fuel at one of the three meltdown-hit reactors as early as this month, with the unit to be the first to undergo the procedure. The removal of the radioactive debris is considered one of the most challenging tasks in decommissioning the Fukushima Daiichi plant, whose reactors were severely damaged by the loss of cooling functions triggered by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan.

NATO / Europe

  • The Guardian view on Ukraine’s Russia offensive: a bold gamble is still playing out. If the startling incursion helps to reshape the conflict, it will do so by resetting the narrative. But it could come at a high price.
  • STWC: A perilous crossroads: why has Ukraine invaded parts of Russia? Each side’s attempts at breaking through the stalemate risk the spiralling of the conflict out of control writes Vladimir Unkovski-Korica.
  • The Parliament Magazine: NATO turned 75 this year. Here are some of the events that impacted the transatlantic military alliance the most.
  • NATO must recognize the potential of open-source intelligence.
  • Responsible Statecraft: Why Russia is far outpacing US/Nato in weapons production. No forward thinking and a defense industry that only thinks of profits, are a bad mix.
  • CEPA: Trump or Not, NATO must change. The alliance faces numerous challenges. To cope, European members should shoulder more of the collective burden.
  • Flight Global: Ukraine pursues retired NATO fighter pilots to fly new F-16 fleet.

Middle East

  • The Guardian: As a former IDF soldier and historian of genocide, I was deeply disturbed by my recent visit to Israel.
  • Guardian live blog: Ceasefire deal in Gaza would temper retaliation from Iran, senior officials say.
  • BBC: US says it aims to ‘lower temperature’ in Middle East.

AUKUS/ Indo-Pacific

Best,

 

Pádraig McCarrick

 

Press and Communications Officer

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament

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