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"I find hope in the work of long-established groups such as the Arms Control Association...[and] I find hope in younger anti-nuclear activists and the movement around the world to formally ban the bomb."

– Vincent Intondi
Professor of History, Montgomery College
July 1, 2020
Nuclear Nonproliferation
  • October 6, 2008

    Russia’s conflict with Georgia in August caused a serious rift in U.S.-Russian relations but does not appear to have harmed the two countries’ cooperation on improving the security of nuclear materials and weapons in Russia, according to administration officials and members of Congress. Speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Sept. 17, Thomas D’Agostino, administrator of the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), discussed the administration’s views on the effect of the recent conflict on nonproliferation programs in Russia. (Continue)

  • October 6, 2008
  • September 10, 2008

    Early this week, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal published articles in which Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice extolled the Bush administration’s record in limiting global nuclear dangers. Those articles apparently stemmed from an extended response that Rice delivered to a reporter’s question at a Sept. 7 press conference in Rabat, Morocco. Rice asserted that the administration’s record on nonproliferation and counterproliferation was “very strong” and “left this situation…in far better shape than we found it.” In making her case, Rice claimed success on a raft of issues, including progress on nuclear affairs with India, Iran, and North Korea. (Continue)

  • September 3, 2008
    Interviewed by Miles Pomper and Peter Crail
  • September 2, 2008

    An expert panel commissioned by Congress advocated Aug. 15 that the United States embark expeditiously on a controversial initiative to substitute conventional projectiles for existing nuclear warheads on some submarine-based missiles. The experts reasoned that the proposal, despite some shortcomings, provides the most viable short-term alternative to using nuclear weapons to counter possible short-notice threats worldwide. (Continue)

  • September 2, 2008

    As the Bush administration seeks to curtail the spread of uranium-enrichment and spent fuel reprocessing technologies abroad, its preferred approaches are losing needed support. These include the controversial Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) and a moratorium among the world's richest countries on exports of the sensitive technologies. (Continue)

  • September 2, 2008

    At a July 8 summit in Hokkaido, Japan, the heads of government of the Group of Eight (G-8), a forum of the largest economies worldwide, continued discussions on expanding their current nonproliferation partnership from a focus on the former Soviet Union to a more global approach. They also took note of the program's achievements to date in the former Soviet Union as well as remaining projects there. (Continue)

  • September 2, 2008

    A UN nonproliferation committee issued a progress report July 30 on states' efforts to implement a global instrument aimed at preventing terrorists and other nonstate actors from acquiring weapons of mass destruction. The report indicated that although many states have instituted a range of measures for this purpose, countries "need to do far more than they have already done" to fulfill their international obligations in this regard. (Continue)

  • September 2, 2008

    In early July, U.S. forces transferred 550 metric tons of yellowcake, the compound made from mined natural uranium ore, from the Iraqi nuclear site of Tuwaitha to a port in Montreal. If the material were processed for military purposes, it would be sufficient for as many as 50 nuclear weapons. The Canadian corporation Cameco purchased the nuclear material.

    In a July 7 briefing, Department of State spokesperson Sean McCormack said the operation was conducted according to applicable International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) regulations. Citing "security concerns," McCormack noted that the transfer was done secretly. An unnamed senior U.S. official told the Associated Press in July that the transferal took nearly three months, beginning in April. (Continue)

  • September 2, 2008

    Syria has denied the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) permission to conduct additional inspections to verify claims by Washington that it had a clandestine nuclear weapons program. In September 2007, Israel bombed a facility near the village of al-Kibar on suspicions that the site was a nuclear reactor under construction with North Korean assistance. (Continue)

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