NIIGATA, Japan (Kyodo) — An elementary school pupil who evacuated from Fukushima in the wake of the 2011 nuclear disaster has skipped school for more than a week since a male teacher added “germ” to his name when addressing him in late November, a local education board said Friday.
The fourth-grade pupil told the teacher, in his 40s, before the summer holidays that he was distressed as other pupils were addressing him by adding “germ” to his name.
According to the education board, the teacher then added “germ” while addressing the boy in a classroom on Nov. 22, just five days after the boy approached the teacher again about his treatment by fellow pupils.
Nov. 22 was also the day of a strong earthquake off Fukushima in the early morning, reminding many of the massive March 2011 quake and tsunami that triggered the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear…
Media attention continues to focus on Donald Trump. He seems happy in the spotlight, even if the revelations are about his conflicts of interest, and the unsuitability of officials that he’s appointing. Trump himself hardly matters, really, as the Republicans will be in charge in the White House, Congress and Senate, and are dominated by anti-science, climate deniers, and hawkish militarists.
NUCLEAR. As I write, South Australians are organising for a demonstration outside Parliamant House for a rather joyful requiem for the Nuclear Fuel Chain Royal Commission’s plan to turn that State into the world’s nuclear toilet. The Dump is Dumped – for now, anyway. Citizens demand action to enforce South Australian Nuclear Waste Storage Facility (Prohibition) Act 2000.
But then, there’s the Federal government’s plan for a nuclear waste at outback Barndioota. They duplicitously claim that this is for “medical” wastes, but it is in fact for the intermediate and high level processed wastes returning to Lucas Heights from France and UK. Kimba, South Australia, may rejoin the discussion on hosting a federal nuclear waste dump. Tiny outback town divided over plan for federal nuclear waste dump.
Members and supporters of the Anti-Nuclear Coalition will gather on Parliament House steps this evening at 6pm for a last farewell to the Premier’s international nuclear waste dump proposal. We will ceremonially, with all pomp and circumstance, consign it to the bin!*
Spokesperson Anne McMenamin said, “We are pleased that the Premier has decided not to proceed with changes to legislation and policy, at this stage, but we are aware that the push towards the dump will continue behind the scenes.
“We want to tell Jay, in no uncertain terms, that ‘No’ means ‘No – not now, not ever.’ The message from the Citizens’ Jury was loud and clear, despite all the efforts to corral them toward a Proceed with Caution finding – the amber light.
“However, we are aware that the Government has given the go-ahead for increased exploration and mining of uranium. We are also aware that the Federal Government’s proposed national dump is still on the agenda.
“These two issues are very much on the minds of the Traditional Owners of the land in which the dump and the mining will occur. The current site for the dump is Barndioota, in the Flinders Ranges, land of the Adnyamathanha people “Adnyamathanha Traditional Owners, Regina McKenzie and Tony Clark, will convey the strong opposition of their people. Regina has just this week been announced as the joint winner of the Australian Conservation Foundation’s 2016 Rawlinson Award for out-standing leadership in her efforts for Indigenous and environmental justice in her region. “The Anti-Nuclear Coalition is extremely concerned that waste for this dump is described as ‘low and intermediate level’ giving the impression that it’s not really dangerous. By international standards, the ‘intermediate level’ waste is really ‘high level’. Further, there is considerable controversy amongst scientists as to the safety of even ‘low level’ ionising radiation.
*We’d like to burn copies of the Royal Commission Report and the Government’s Know Nuclear propaganda, but doubt that would be appreciated on Parliament House steps, so we will chuck it in a big yellow-cake drum, with a humorous oration, a great new song, and a salute to the valiant members of the Citizens’ Jury.
Library of Victoria 1919 – ANZAC Sermon – To Right the Wrongs …
H.M.T. Orsova, nearing Suez, 28th April 1919
Vida Goldstein:
‘The Anzac sermon was preached by an army chaplain; it was a glorification of the Australians, with some humorous sidelights.
It had none of the dignity and impressiveness that one would have thought the occasion demanded, and offered no comfort to those present who had lost relatives at Gallipoli and on other battlefields.
He denied absolutely the oft-repeated statement that the Australian soldiers were undisciplined. They were splendidly disciplined, he said, but their disciplined conduct had no trace of servility.
He spoke feelingly of the social conditions that had killed soldiers before they entered the trenches.
The evidence in the trenches of the terrible results of those social conditions had roused many men to the sense of their duty to their fellows, and made them resolve that when they returned to civil life they would do all in their power to right the wrongs under which their comrades had lived.’
Woman Voter 7 August 1919 State Library of Victoria
First World War Women working for peace 1914-1919 womensweb.com.au
“History is not dead and gone, it lives on in us in the way it shapes our thought, especially our thought about what is possible.”
Daphne Marlatt 2001
Canadian technology to address the global medical isotope supply challenge
14 September 2016. A consortium of institutions led by TRIUMF, Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics and accelerator-based science, is granting sole rights for its proprietary technetium-99m (Tc-99m) production technology to ARTMS™ Products, Inc (ARTMS). Technetium-99m is used in over 80% of all nuclear medicine imaging procedures and is vital to patient care in areas such as cardiology, oncology, and neurology. …
Typically sourced from an ageing global reactor fleet, Tc-99m has been subject to significant supply disruptions in recent years. ARTMS’ production technology promises to provide a reliable, cost effective, and safe supply of this critical medical isotope. The license includes all the required products and procedures for the production of Tc-99m using common hospital-based and commercial cyclotrons, through the bombardment of a high-energy proton beam against specific chemical ‘targets’. ….
“The ARTMS production technology offers many advantages, and that is why we believe our technology is truly disruptive and that it will gain widespread adoption,” Dr. Schaffer added. “Not only does the ARTMS production technology provide regional supply security of Tc-99m, it also offers favourable economics, and aids to eliminate the need for highly-enriched uranium, which is currently used by nuclear reactors to produce this isotope.”
“This agreement represents the culmination of six years of hard work by a dedicated team from across Canada, including TRIUMF, the BC Cancer Agency, Lawson Health Research Institute, and the Centre for Probe Development and Commercialization,” said Dr. Jonathan Bagger, Director of TRIUMF. “Today marks the completion of a major milestone as we move to commercialize a decentralized, green, and Canadian-made, technology that can produce Tc-99m daily at hundreds of hospital-based cyclotrons around the world. This licensing agreement marks the beginning of a new era in Tc-99m production and supply security.”
Former nuclear site in Washington state is ‘causing workers to develop terminal illnesses’ – and it won’t be cleaned up for another 50 more years (photos)
The Hanford Site in Washington state was used to produce plutonium from 1943 through the end of the Cold War
Washington River Protection Solutions is now cleaning up the site
Workers at the site say they are being exposed to radioactive fumes
A watchdog group says that three workers have died as a result of exposure to nuclear waste on the job
Just this year, 61 workers have allegedly been exposed to toxic materials
But the government contractor says that everyone who has been checked out for possible exposure has been cleared to return to work
A former nuclear site in Washington state is poisoning workers and threatening the health of those who live around it, according to a new investigation.
Some experts have called the former Hanford nuclear plant ‘the most toxic place in America’ and ‘an underground Chernobyl waiting to happen’.
The site, located in a rural area along the Columbia River, was commissioned by the Manhattan Project to produce plutonium for the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II.
It remained an active nuclear site until the end of the Cold War, when it was decommissioned and the Department of Energy subcontracted Washington River Protection Solutions to start the clean-up.
But current and former workers at the site have told NBC that the underground containers holding the site’s nuclear waste are leaking, and that they have been exposed to the toxic fumes because the company has not given them the right safety equipment.
Their health issues include dementia, nerve damage, memory loss and respiratory problems.
Watchdog group Hanford Challenge says that at least three workers’ deaths have been linked to exposure at the site, but officials with Washington River Protection Solutions have refused to admit they are putting their workers in danger. Those workers are Gary Sall, Deb Fish and Dan Golden.
But several studies show that’s not the case and just this year, 61 workers have allegedly been exposed to toxic materials.
Carter entered office and promptly pushed through Congress the 1978 Non-Proliferation Act
Carter’s U.S. nuclear doctrine was enormously unpopular among America’s nuclear science elite
To the chagrin of the powerful nuclear weapons and nuclear power lobbies, Carter abandoned the idea of a new nuclear renaissance.
Jimmy Carter’s re-election defeat brought the nuclear establishment another opportunity.
United States Circumvented Laws To Help Japan Accumulate Tons of Plutonium, DC BureauBy Joseph Trento, April 9th, 2012 “….Stopping the Spread of Fissile Material After Jimmy Carter won the presidency in 1976, he instituted an aggressive policy to control the spread of fissile materials. As a former nuclear reactor engineer on a Navy submarine, Carter knew better than any other world leader the immense power locked up in plutonium and highly enriched uranium. He was determined to keep it out of the hands of even our closest non-nuclear allies – including Japan.
Carter had good reason for this policy. Despite Japan’s ratification of the NPT in 1976, a study conducted for the CIA the following year named Japan as one of the three countries most able to go nuclear before 1980. Only the Japanese people’s historic opposition to nuclear weapons argued against Japanese deployment. Every other factor argued for a Japanese nuclear capability. Continue reading →
I could fill this newspaper with the names of Trump staffers who have emerged from such groups:
Frightened by Donald Trump? You don’t know the half of it, Guardian, George Monbiot, 1 Dec 16 Many of his staffers are from an opaque corporate misinformation network. We must understand this if we are to have any hope of fighting back against them. Yes, Donald Trump’s politics are incoherent. But those who surround him know just what they want, and his lack of clarity enhances their power. To understand what is coming, we need to understand who they are. I know all too well, because I have spent the past 15 years fighting them.
Over this time, I have watched as tobacco, coal, oil, chemicals and biotech companies have poured billions of dollars into an international misinformation machine composed of thinktanks, bloggers and fake citizens’ groups. Its purpose is to portray the interests of billionaires as the interests of the common people, to wage war against trade unions and beat down attempts to regulate business and tax the very rich. Now the people who helped run this machine are shaping the government.
I first encountered the machine when writing about climate change. The fury and loathing directed at climate scientists and campaigners seemed incomprehensible until I realised they were fake: the hatred had been paid for. The bloggers and institutes whipping up this anger were funded by oil and coal companies. Continue reading →
Climate change will stir ‘unimaginable’ refugee crisis, says military Unchecked global warming is greatest threat to 21st-century security where mass migration could be ‘new normal’, say senior military, Guardian, Damian Carrington, 1 Dec 16, Climate change is set to cause a refugee crisis of “unimaginable scale”, according to senior military figures, who warn that global warming is the greatest security threat of the 21st century and that mass migration will become the “new normal”.
The generals said the impacts of climate change were already factors in the conflicts driving a current crisis of migration into Europe, having been linked to the Arab Spring, the war in Syria and the Boko Haram terrorist insurgency.
Military leaders have long warned that global warming could multiply and accelerate security threats around the world by provoking conflicts and migration. They are now warning that immediate action is required.
“Climate change is the greatest security threat of the 21st century,” said Maj Gen Munir Muniruzzaman, chairman of the Global Military Advisory Council on climate change and a former military adviser to the president of Bangladesh. He said one metre of sea level rise will flood 20% of his nation. “We’re going to see refugee problems on an unimaginable scale, potentially above 30 million people.”
Previously, Bangladesh’s finance minister, Abul Maal Abdul Muhith, called on Britain and other wealthy countries to accept millions of displaced people.
Brig Gen Stephen Cheney, a member of the US Department of State’s foreign affairs policy board and CEO of the American Security Project, said: “Climate change could lead to a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions. We’re already seeing migration of large numbers of people around the world because of food scarcity, water insecurity and extreme weather, and this is set to become the new normal.
UN rejects UK appeal on Assange, Justice for Assange On 30 November 2016, the United Nations rejected the United Kingdom’s attempt to appeal the UN’s February ruling in favour of Julian Assange.
The decision therefore stands and the UK and Sweden are once again required to immediately put an end to Mr. Assange’s arbitrary detention and afford him monetary compensation.
Earlier this year the United Nations concluded the 16 month long case to which the UK was a party. The UK lost, appealed, and today – lost again. The UN instructed the UK and Sweden to take immediate steps to ensure Mr. Assange’s liberty, protection, and enjoyment of fundamental human rights. No steps have been taken, jeopardising Mr. Assange’s life, health and physical integrity, and undermining the UN system of human rights protection.
Now, the United Nations has found that the United Kingdom’s request for review of this decision (filed on March 24) was inadmissible; the United Kingdom has now reached the end of the road in its attempt to overturn the ruling. As a member of the Security Council and the United Nations Human Rights Council, the United Kingdom must respect its commitment to the United Nations, and release Mr. Assange immediately. Now, more than ever, moral leadership is required; maintaining Mr. Assange’s effective detention (which stands at six years as of 7 December, 2016) will only serve to green light future abuses against defenders of free speech and human rights.
Mr. Assange stated “Now that all appeals are exhausted I expect that the UK and Sweden will comply with their international obligations and set me free. It is an obvious and grotesque injustice to detain someone for six years who hasn’t even been charged with an offence.”….. https://justice4assange.com/?rejects
MLA for Nhulunbuy Yingiya Guyula has expressed relief and satisfaction at the dismissal of the Electoral Commissioner’s challenge to his election to the NT Legislative Assembly
by consent orders sought by both parties and made by Justice Southwood today in the Court of Disputed Returns.
““From the moment it was suggested that I might be disqualified from nominating for Parliament
because of my claimed membership of a local government advisory body called the Milingimbi Local Authority,
I have said that I was never a member of that body,” Mr Guyula explained.
“I did not nominate to be a member, I did not consent to being appointed to the Authority by the East Arnhem Regional Council (“EARC”), and I did not even know it had passed a resolution to appoint me.
In fact when I was asked whether I wanted to be nominated and appointed I said no because I was too busy working in remote homeland schools and would not be able to attend regular meetings.”
“Mr Guyula’s lawyer Ken Parish explained that his evidence was not disputed, and
was corroborated by evidence from other Milingimbi community members.
Moreover, the Electoral Commission accepted in submissions to Justice Southwood that Mr Guyula had attended a handful of Authority meetings not as a member of that body but as a djirrikaymirri or senior elder of the Guyula Djambarrbuyngu tribe. …
“Mr Guyula said that the most pleasing aspect of today’s result was that he would now be
free to focus completely on providing effective representation for the people of Nhulunbuy
and North East Arnhem Land in Parliament over the next 4 years.
“I stood for Parliament with the aim of helping to create harmony, understanding and mutual respect between Yolngu and Balanda people, laws and institutions.
Today’s Court decision is one small but important step on the road to achieving that aim,” Mr Guyula said.”
United States Circumvented Laws To Help Japan Accumulate Tons of Plutonium, DC Bureau By Joseph Trento, April 9th, 2012 “….Stopping the Spread of Fissile Material After Jimmy Carter won the presidency in 1976, he instituted an aggressive policy to control the spread of fissile materials. As a former nuclear reactor engineer on a Navy submarine, Carter knew better than any other world leader the immense power locked up in plutonium and highly enriched uranium. He was determined to keep it out of the hands of even our closest non-nuclear allies – including Japan.
Antinuclear 