Docudharma Times Friday March 26

South Korea pushes to recycle nuclear power plant fuel

As a growing nuclear power plant builder and exporter, South Korea wants to reprocess nuclear fuel. That’s counter to a US deal.

By Donald Kirk, Correspondent

Uljin, South Korea

Through thick glass windows beneath 20 feet of water lurk canisters containing spent nuclear fuel rods, stored after having powered one of the four reactors at this nuclear energy site on South Korea’s east coast, 100 miles southeast of Seoul.

“Currently, we have space for spent fuel rods until 2016,” says Park Chan-sung, an official at the site, the newest of four nuclear power plant complexes with 20 reactors operating under the aegis of the state-owned Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co. “Plans for after 2016 are under discussion.”

The issue of what to do with the fuel rods is reaching critical mass. South Korea is a rising manufacturer of nuclear reactors and exporter of nuclear power plants.

Wee Rex found in Australia

From Times Online

March 26, 2010  

Anne Barrowclough, Sydney

While the mighty T-Rex was terrorising the continents of the northern hemisphere, Australia had its very own tyrannosaur – although it was, admittedly more of a Wee-Rex than its giant cousin.

A hip bone fossil of a small Tyrannosaurus Rex found in the state of Victoria by an international team of scientists provides the first evidence that tyrannosaurs also survived in the southern continents. The antipodean dinosaur, however, while having the same small arms and powerful jaws, was only one third the size of its northern cousin and lived during the Cretaceous period, around 110 million years ago. T- Rex came along 40 million years later, 70 million years ago during the late Cretaceous.

“The existence of this hip bone shows that about 100 million years ago, in the Early Cretaceous period, small tyrannosaurs were found in other parts of the world,” said Tom Rich, senior curator of Vertebrate Palaeontology at Museum Victoria who led the team resopnsible for finding the fossil.

USA

Accusations Fly Between Parties Over Threats and Vandalism



By MICHAEL COOPER

Published: March 25, 2010

IVY, Va. – The authorities here confirmed Thursday that a gas line had been deliberately cut at the home of a brother of a Democratic congressman who voted for the health care bill, making it potentially the most dangerous of many acts of violence and threats against supporters of the bill in the last week.

The house had been mistakenly listed on the blog of a Tea Party activist as the home of the congressman, Tom Perriello, a first-term Democrat representing southern Virginia. But the damage that took place on Tuesday was no blunder, the authorities said.

Obama readies steps to fight foreclosures, particularly for unemployed



By Renae Merle and Dina ElBoghdady

Washington Post Staff Writer

Friday, March 26, 2010

The Obama administration plans to overhaul how it is tackling the foreclosure crisis, in part by requiring lenders to temporarily slash or eliminate monthly mortgage payments for many borrowers who are unemployed, senior officials said Thursday.

Banks and other lenders would have to reduce the payments to no more than 31 percent of a borrower’s income, which would typically be the amount of unemployment insurance, for three to six months. In some cases, administration officials said, a lender could allow a borrower to skip payments altogether.

Europe

Merkel hardball tactics pay off in Greece aid deal

Friday, 26 March 2010

By Michael Savage and Vanessa Mock In Brussels

A multi-billion-pound deal to rescue the crisis-hit Greek economy was finally agreed last night after France and Germany resolved a bitter dispute over how to ease the worst crisis to hit the euro since its launch.

The package, which could be worth as much as €25bn (£22.4bn), will crucially see Greece sent to seek “substantial” aid from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), an outcome that will be viewed across Europe as a decisive victory for Angela Merkel in a show of strength with the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy.

EU opens internal borders to long-stay visa holders, sparking security fears

Activists warn that human traffickers could exploit recent changes in European Union travel laws. Non-EU citizens with long-stay visas are now allowed to travel freely throughout the Schengen zone.

SECURITY | 26.03.2010  

Patsy Sorensen has been helping human trafficking victims across Europe escape lives of extreme poverty and abuse for more than 20 years. She says their traffickers often arrive in Europe on three-month visas but use forged documents to continue operating. New rules agreed to by the European Union may make it easier for the criminals to do their business without detection, she fears.

The bloc decided this week to allow non-European holders of long-stay visas to travel freely across the 25 countries of the Schengen zone, where border controls no longer exist.

Sorensen argues that the new rules will allow criminal gangs to exploit the open borders without fear of being caught.

Middle East

Allawi’s strength in Iraqi election shows country is still divided

 

By Hannah Allam | McClatchy Newspapers

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Secular Iraqi candidate Ayad Allawi has overcome extensive political maneuvering against him and emerged as the main challenger to incumbent Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, whose State of Law coalition is tied with Allawi’s Iraqiya alliance in a race that’s too close to call.

With only a few thousand votes now separating the Allawi and Maliki coalitions, the election has shown that U.S. forces are preparing to withdraw from a deeply fragmented Iraq in which sectarian interests remain paramount.

Obama squeezed between Israel and Iran

THE ROVING EYE  

By Pepe Escobar  

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) annual show in Washington would hardly be out of place in a Quentin Tarantino movie; picture a giant hall crammed with 7,500 very powerful people regimented by a very powerful lobby – plus half of the United States Senate and more than a third of the congress – basically calling in unison for Palestinian and Iranian blood.

The AIPAC 2010 show predictably was yet one more “bomb Iran” special; but it was also a call to arms against the Barack Obama administration, as far as the turbo-charging of the illegal colonization of East Jerusalem is concerned. The administration has reacted to the quarrel with a masterpiece of schizophrenic kabuki (classical Japanese dance-drama) theater. Corporate media insisted there was a deep “crisis” between the unshakeable allies. Nonsense. One just has to look at the facts.

Asia

China cracks down on reporting of Google conflict

Censorship conflict between Beijing and Google highlighted by restrictions issued to media outlets, websites and bloggers



Bring up the subject of internet censorship in China, and most people’s minds turn to the Great Firewall – the set of filters and blockades aimed at preventing ordinary web users from seeing politically sensitive material. But it’s also well-known that the government in Beijing also censors in a number of other ways, not least by pressuring media outlets, news sites and bloggers not to discuss certain topics.

It’s no surprise, then, that the latest topic to warrant treatment is Google’s spat with the Chinese authorities. What is more unusual, perhaps, is that somebody has broken cover and published the censorship guidelines put out by officials in their attempt to suppress news of the battle with Google.

Face to face with Pakistan’s most wanted

Robert Fisk becomes the first Western journalist to interview Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, the man accused of masterminding the Mumbai massacre

Friday, 26 March 2010

As Pakistani ministers and the country’s army chiefs lobbied the Obama administration in Washington this week for increased military funding for the fight against Al Qa’ida militants, the top man on the US, UN and EU most wanted list in Pakistan moved freely in the streets of Lahore.

In his first interview with a western newspaper, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed – suspected of organising the slaughter of 166 Indians in Mumbai in November 2008 – denied responsibility for the bloodbath and told The Independent that he had won his court battles to remain a free man.

Africa

‘No evidence’ WFP’s Somalia food aid diverted

The UN World Food Programme has denied a claim that up to half the food aid to Somalia was being diverted to Islamist militants and corrupt contractors.

The BBC

WFP officials said there was no evidence to back up the claim made in a report by a UN monitoring group.

The UN’s aid chief in Somalia said the report was based on “hearsay” and not backed up by any documentary evidence.

The aid chief, Mark Bowden, said the flow of funds to the WFP operation in Somalia had dropped after the report.

The UN Monitoring Group on Somalia was initially set up by the Security Council to supervise the arms embargo against the war-torn country.

Their critical report was leaked to the news media earlier this month.

Niger coup: Can Africa use military power for good?

Niger’s junta flexed its political and military power in ousting a strongman who overstayed his electoral mandate. Secretly, many locals are happy with the Niger coup.

By Hannah Armstrong, Correspondent / March 25, 2010  

Niamey, Niger

Weeks after the Feb. 18 coup in Niger, the gates of the presidential palace still gape with holes blasted by mutinous commandos. No one knows when there will be a new leader to order that the debris cluttering the lawns be cleared.

For now, a military junta is still calling the shots.

On its face, the latest military overthrow of an elected African leader is yet another setback for democracy in West Africa. There have been other coups on the continent, and the justification is often that the current leader is corrupt or running roughshod over the Constitution. The ouster of strongman Mamadou Tandja, who overstayed his electoral mandate, is once again raising the question: Is there such a thing as a “good coup”?

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