Niger coup: Good for Tuareg rebels, bad for uranium investors, The Christian Science Monitor 23 March 2010, The military junta announced it will audit all uranium exploration permits awarded before last month’s Niger coup. Evidence has emerged that the permits enriched the ousted president and devastated the Tuareg population……, foreign investors from China, Australia, South Africa, America, and Canada have flocked to the landlocked Saharan state. Niger’s authorities have awarded at least 50 uranium exploration permits in the two years since government officials busted a 40-year mining monopoly held by France’s Areva SA, according to mining officials. But government watchdogs say these opaque contracts illegally enriched Mr. Tandja and his family, even while food shortages plagued the Saharan state……
Meanwhile, scientists documented dangerous levels of radioactive contamination still present in water and dirt in a survey of uranium mining villages Arlit and Akokan conducted by Greenpeace International and France’s CRIIRAD, an independent watchdog group. A full report of findings is due later this month.
Archive for March, 2010
Uranium investors drawn by the unfair conditions in Niger
March 27, 2010Afghanistan’s child victims of depleted uranium
March 27, 2010VICTIMS OF URANIUM MUNITIONS USED BY THE US FORCES IN AFGHANISTAN: Creative-i /23 March 2010, Warning – Horrific Images aution: The images presented here are so horrific that it had me in tears just dealing with the ‘technics’ of uploading them. As with the Gaza victims file, I have left them off the Home Page. If you wish to view them click on the Continue Reading link. And I urge folks to do something about this, how can we stand aside? It is after all, being done in OUR name….. (more…)
Soldiers demand study on health effects of depleted uranium
March 27, 2010The veterans want help with their health conditions and treatment now. Their pain is real physiological damage.
Depleted Uranium Research-DU affects DNA, Veterans Today, March 20, 2010 by Denise Nichols · -More Research Indicated To Assess Health Risk. The research on depleted uranium comes out of French researchers that examined the manner DNA is affected by enriched and depleted uranium. The metal or chemical effect it seems is the more important in depleted uranium exposure. (more…)
Depleted uranium used by Israel in Gaza
March 27, 2010Israel used depleted uranium ammo during last war in Gaza – experts, The Voice of Russia, Mar 19, 2010, Israel used depleted uranium ammunition during its Cast Lead military operation in Gaza in the winter of 2008-2009. According to the Al-Hayat newspaper, this follows from forensic studies of Palestinians’ bodies by Italian experts. (more…)
Mainsream media – self-censoring the issue of depleted uranium?
March 27, 2010Depleted Uranium: A War Crime Within a War Crime, Creative-i , By William Bowles, 18 March, 2010 — Creative-i.infoAs if destroying a country and its culture ain’t bad enough, how about destroying its future, its children? I want to scream it from the rooftops! We are complicit in crimes of such enormity that I find it difficult to find the words to describe how I feel about this crime committed in my name! In the name of the ‘civilized’ world?…..
Even the BBC was forced to acknowledge the reality (Listen: ‘Child deformities ‘increasing’ in Falluja’
4 March, 2010). True to form I searched the BBC Website in vain for the video clip I watched last week, so you are spared the horrific scenes I witnessed, recorded in Fallujah’s main hospital. Had this been Saddam’s legacy, we would have seen images like the one above endlessly repeated in mass media, complete with UN resolutions and the like.
So how come this isn’t a headline?
Creative-i / Depleted Uranium: A War Crime Within a War Crime By William Bowles
Weapons grade uranium – USA to France?
March 27, 2010Shipping bomb-grade uranium to France, knoxnews.com, Frank Munger, 19 March 2010, There’s a pending application before the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for an export license to ship 160 kilograms of uranium (enriched to 93.5 percent U-235) from the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge to France for use as fuel in the research reactor at the Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) near Grenoble….The Y-12 spokesman would not say whether the uranium would be sent by air or sea. “For security reasons we cannot describe details on a proposed shipment,” he said.
France has a nuclear weapons program and asked why it doesn’t supply its own HEU for the reactor, Wyatt responded, “This question deals with French policy, and is not a question Y-12 can answer.”…..The shipments would occur between June, 1, 2010 and Dec. 31, 2012.
Shipping bomb-grade uranium to France | Frank Munger’s Atomic City Underground | knoxnews.com
Uranium mill faces legal action
March 27, 2010Pinion Ridge uranium mill under fire, The Energy Collective, 13 March 2010, Environmental groups file multiple legal challenges “…The Sheep Mountain Alliance (SMA), a Telluride, Colo., environmental group, and its legal counsel, the Energy Minerals Law Center (EMLC), located in Durango, Colo, have taken a two-pronged approach to try to stop the development of the Pinion Ridge uranium mill. (more…)
Niger: call for inquiry into uranium deals with foreign companies
March 27, 2010Uranium Major Niger Urged to Review Contracts, ABC News, NIAMEY (Reuters) 14 March 2010, - The new junta ruling in Niger, one of the world’s biggest uranium producers, should review and possibly renegotiate dozens of resource exploitation contracts, civil rights groups said on Saturday. The West African state, which produces 7.5 percent of the world’s uranium, has a longstanding partnership with French nuclear group Areva as well as more recent ones with Australian, Canadian, Chinese, South Korean and other groups.
“Given the opacity surrounding the granting of mining and oil permits in recent years, we urge the immediate creation of a commission of inquiry … and any necessary steps, notably the renegotiation of contracts,” the ROTAB group, a collective of anti-corruption pressure groups, said in a statement.
Uranium One’s losses due to low prices
March 27, 2010Uranium One announces $36.5m net loss for full year 2009 , 11 Mar 2010,(Reuters) “….- Uranium One Inc (UUU.TO: Quote) posted a net loss in 2009, hurt mainly by lower realized uranium prices, ….Earnings from mine operations fell 41.2 percent to $54.6 million. The company said average realized sales prices fell 30 percent in 2009.
Shares of the Vancouver, British Columbia-based miner closed at C$2.81 Wednesday on the Toronto Stock Exchange. (Reporting by Abhiram Nandakumar in Bangalore; Editing by Maju Samuel)
orruption shadow over uranium investment in Kazakhstan
March 27, 2010Kazakh ex-uranium boss jailed for corruption, Daily Times , 12 March 2010, ASTANA: A Kazakh court sentenced a former uranium tycoon to 14 years in jail for theft and corruption on Friday in a case that has alarmed foreign investors working in the former Soviet republic. One of Kazakhstan’s most prominent business figures, Mukhtar Dzhakishev was arrested last year on accusations of corruption, theft and illegal sales of uranium assets to foreign companies.The trial was held behind closed doors and involved hearings only into theft and corruption accusations…..
His arrest left Kazatomprom’s foreign partners such as Canada’s UraniumOne worried about the future of their projects. Other investors include France’s Areva and Japanese companies such as Toshiba Corporation.
The case, along with a string of other high-profile arrests in Kazakhstan, the world’s biggest uranium producer, has fuelled speculation of an intensifying power struggle within the political elite………..
Kazakhstan’s authorities have said that the case is part of the country’s broader attempts to root out corruption from its key industries
Daily Times – Leading News Resource of Pakistan – Kazakh ex-uranium boss jailed for corruptionC
