Author Archives: kerr

ACW on Nuclear Weapons Accidents

I like to post primary source documents about proliferation. But Jeffrey has posted a bunch in a really outstanding “column”:http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/10/30/nightmare_on_nuke_street?page=full over at _Foreign Policy_ which describes a bunch of nuclear weapons-realted accidents and near-misses that have occurred over the years.

On this blog, I refrain from making policy recommendations, but I can make an exception in this case:

bq. There is no reason to believe the apocryphal story about the British Army choosing red uniforms because they do not show blood. But after 60-odd years of nuclear accidents, incidents, and whatnot, I can recommend that the STRATCOM commander consider brown pants.

Definitely check it out….you can augment your document collection whilst giggling.

Photo of KRL Entrance

An observant reader sent “this short article”:http://www.thenewstribe.com/2012/10/18/passport-of-ex-a-q-khans-meteorologist-seized-name-placed-on-ecl/ about the ex-meteorologist for Dr. A.Q. Khan Research Laboratories, Dr Nazir Ahmed, who, according to the piece,

bq. was placed on Exit Control List (ECL) and his passport was suspended after suspected of having ties with the global network of Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadir Khan involved in expanding nuclear technology.

Interestingly, the article contains a photo of the entrance to KRL “Take a look.”:http://www.thenewstribe.com/2012/10/18/passport-of-ex-a-q-khans-meteorologist-seized-name-placed-on-ecl/

Regulations Implementing EU Iran Sanctions

Yesterday, the EU Council “announced”:http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_Data/docs/pressdata/EN/foraff/132833.pdf that it was placing additional sanctions on Iran.

Well, “here is”:http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2012:282:0016:0022:EN:PDF the implementing regulation. And “here is”:http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2012:282:0058:0069:EN:PDF the Council decision as it appeared in the official EU Journal.

The Annexes of these regulations always make for interesting reading because they provide details regarding the decision to sanction an entity that typically don’t appear in U.S. sanctions announcements.

1999 SILEX NPAS

I meant to post this a while ago. “Via”:http://thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/silex-and-proliferation MIT’s Scott Kemp, we now have a “public version”:http://www.princeton.edu/~rskemp/SILEX-NPAS-1999 of the unclassified U.S. 1999 Nuclear Proliferation Assessment Statement. The United States issued the required NPAS in order to conclude the 1999 “_Agreement for Cooperation Between Australia and the United States of America Concerning Technology for the Separation of Isotopes of Uranium by Laser Excitation_.”:http://www.princeton.edu/~rskemp/SILEX-treaty.pdf

Scott’s “BAS article”:http://thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/silex-and-proliferation is a great summary of the nonproliferation issues concerning SILEX.