CND Press Roundup - 12 January

• Catholic bishops TPNW call
• Vatican News reports that leading Catholic bishops in Britain have reiterated their call, ahead of the TPNW coming into force, for the UK “to forsake its nuclear arsenal”. The Bishops said that “the resources spent on manufacturing, maintaining and upgrading these weapons of mass destruction should be reinvested to alleviate the suffering of the poorest and most vulnerable members of our society, for the Common Good of all peoples.”
• Biden nuclear challenges
• Edward Ifft, distinguished visiting fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, has argued in an article for the European Leadership Network that although the Biden administration will face “a daunting array of difficult problems”, issues of “international peace and security, and most especially nuclear weapons, need to be near the top of the list” of priorities. 
• After stabilising New START, Ifft argues that Biden should improve bilateral US-Russian relations, re-establishing “problem-solving, respectful contacts”, such as allowing scientists from both countries to jointly work on “verification problems which stand in the way of further reductions in nuclear weapons.”
• US nuclear arsenal under Biden 
• Come March, Guardian analysis points out, Biden will be faced with crucial decisions on the future of the United States’ nuclear arsenal—as the administration puts together its first defence budget, which will include a nuclear modernisation programme which was already set to cost over $1trillion when Trump took office. One radical move by Biden could be to ‘slow down work on a new generation intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM)’.
• Pranay Vaddi, formerly a senior arms control official in the US state department, said: “We are at an inflection point where the ICBMs are not yet being produced. It makes sense to us to say: hey, we’re willing to have two or three hundred ICBMs instead of 400 now deployed and see what the Russians are willing to reduce in response.”
• Chain of command 
• David Schwartz, who was a senior Reagan administration official responsible for nuclear weapons strategy, and Steven Simon, a research analyst at the Quincy Institute, argue in Foreign Policy that Biden needs to address the one-man nuclear chain of command.
• “When he takes office, Biden should convene a task force of experts to review the issues and come up with practical options that could be implemented as part of the ongoing nuclear modernization. No one in the world should have to worry that an unstable American leader could unilaterally make a decision with such unthinkable consequences.”

Nuclear power 

• Bradwell plant
• The Environment Agency has told the China Nuclear Group (CGN), the developer behind plans to build a new nuclear reactor in Bradwell, Essex, that it ‘must resolve at least six safety issues before it can move forward’, the Guardian reports. 
• EA concerns include questions over the disposal of radioactive waste. A representative of the agency said he expects CGN to resolve the issues identified “over the next year or so”, warning that the reactor design will only be approved “if we are satisfied that all the issues have been addressed.” 
• SMRs
• A feature on SMRs in City A.M. includes an interview with Tom Samson, chief executive of the consortium overseeing Rolls Royce’s development of the mini nuclear reactors. Samson told the financial paper: “Effectively, what we’re doing is building a nuclear power station in a factory… That’s what’s unique about this project.”
• He continued: “We’re not looking for the government to stick its balance sheet behind this after the initial investment. What we’ve got is a very efficient capital deployment programme that minimises the role of government in getting it to market.”
• “Renewables are intermittent – what nuclear gives you is dependable, reliable, constantly available clean energy that can be run all day.”

Iran nuclear deal 

• IAEA warning
• IAEA boss Rafael Grossi said yesterday that the revival of the Iran nuclear deal must happen in the coming weeks, Reuters reports. “It is clear that we don’t have many months ahead of us. We have weeks”. Meanwhile, an Iranian lawmaker said that the country would give Biden until 21 February to reverse sanctions. 
• Israel sabotage 
• Bloomberg reports that Israel is plotting how to derail Biden’s attempts to revive the Iran nuclear deal. Netanyahu’s officials are pondering whether to pursue the high-profile, attacking campaign that they undertook against Obama in 2015, with some believing that behind-the-scenes engagement may be more effective. 
• Israel will start by sending envoys to Washington, who will argue that the US shouldn’t abandon sanctions on Iran without a new deal, for a tougher stance on Iran’s nuclear project, and for its ballistic missiles and regional proxies to be addressed.