Pakistan’s nukes are threat to the world

One of the biggest challenges to the Barack Obama’s Administration is to ensure safety of the Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal in case of a possible collapse of Pakistan. Pakistan is the hub for the fundamentalist violence and camps for training in terrorist activities. The nuclear weapons or “dirty bombs” (basically a radioactivity dispersal device) may even land in the hands of fundamentalists or Jihadis. Under the present scenario of uncertain political leadership in Pakistan, world community should be concerned about possible misadventure from Pakistan’ army chief. The control of nuclear weapons with the army is not strategically desirable for India.

Tough-line diplomacy by India and other world leaders can only make Pakistan leaders to see reason and ensure that the nuclear weapons and radioactive materials are in safe custody of the civilian government and would not fall into the wrong hands.

Indian nuclear deals for whose gain?

The Bush administration helped the American companies to sell their nuclear reactors and other nuclear-related components to India. Similar story goes with France, Russia and a few more countries. Others thus get the business at whose cost? Of course, at the cost of India. India may get a few more nuclear power reactors, which may not increase its percentage nuclear contribution after 8 to 10 years, when the demand also would have increased to a great extent. But, India will be giving over US$100 billion business to these countries! These countries were without much nuclear business for a long time.

This may result ultimately in stagnation of India’s own R & D activities in nuclear fuel cycle operations. NEED is the mother of invention. When there is no need, why spend time & money on developmental activities. That means commercialization of India’s “hard-earned” thorium fuel cycle operations will be a few decades away from now.

India should also work seriously to commercialize other non-conventional energy sources, like wind, solar, and geo-thermal, so that additional future requirements will be met by the mix of energy sources other than fast-depleting fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas.

Nuclear Fuel Bank Initiative by IAEA Receives Crucial EU Support

The European Union (EU) recently pledged Euro 25 million ($32 million) towards a nuclear fuel bank proposal to be placed under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)’s control. The EU pledge, along with those by Norway, the United Arab Emirates and the USA shows growing momentum for a new more equitable framework for nuclear energy, says IAEA Director General. The pledge is a boost for the initiative originally launched by the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) in 2006.

Enriched uranium provides the fuel for many of the world´s nuclear power reactors, and the enrichment process is a vital process in a multi-step nuclear fuel cycle. The enrichment of uranium, while a necessary step in the creation of the fuel that power many of the world´s civilian nuclear reactors, can also be employed for use in nuclear weapons.

An IAEA fuel bank would guarantee supply of nuclear fuel and reactor services to bona fide States and protect them from politically motivated disruption of supply while at the same time minimizing the risk of nuclear proliferation through dissemination of the enrichment technologies. This initiative will provide necessary support for countries like India in case of withdrawal of nuclear cooperation by the partners in the recently signed nuclear deals, for some reason or the other.