United for Peace of Pierce County, WA - We nonviolently oppose the reliance on unilateral military actions rather than cooperative diplomacy.

Asia Times Online reported Friday that on Feb. 1 the director of Rosatom, Russia's nuclear power agency, and U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez "signed a trade agreement allowing Russia to incrementally boost enriched uranium exports to the U.S. The deal allows the sale of Russian enriched uranium directly to U.S. utilities." -- As a result, "[b]y 2014, one in five American nuclear plants will be running on Russian uranium," according to M.K. Bhadrakumar, a former Indian diplomat. -- "The access to the U.S. market enables Russia to fully utilize its uranium enrichment capacity, which stands at 40% of the world total." -- "According to the U.S. Nuclear Energy Institute, the American market will have a uranium shortage beginning in 2011 so it makes sense for the U.S. to liberalize its market for Russian uranium." -- But there is also a political dimension to the agreement, Bhadrakumar said. -- "Last Friday's deal underscores U.S. support of the Russian move to create an international cartel for nuclear fuel that strengthens the non-proliferation regime," which will involve "an international uranium enrichment center in Angarsk, eastern Siberia, which will supply enriched uranium to third countries planning to develop global nuclear energy." -- Bhadrakumar believes that one of the purposes of the new regime is to isolate Iran: "the U.S. implicitly associated last Friday's deal in Washington with Russia ceasing nuclear operations in Iran, where it is engaged in the construction of a nuclear power plant in Bushehr. In retrospect, the manifest haste with which Russia fulfilled — in eight installments during the six-week period since December 16 — its obligations for supplying low-enriched nuclear fuel totaling 82 tons for the Bushehr plant falls into perspective. Russia completed on January 28 — barely four days ahead of last Friday's deal in Washington — its eighth and final delivery of fuel for Bushehr." -- Bhadrakumar concluded by citing a statement posted on the web site of Russia's foreign ministry that suggested that "in addition to the provisions in the draft agreed at Berlin on January 22, no matter what the IAEA chief [Mohammed ElBaradei] might come up with [in his report to the Security Council in the third week of February], the upcoming resolution might insist that Iran should stop uranium enrichment as a condition for resumption of talks. Tehran will be certain to reject such a pre-condition. -- But Iran will be left to realize how a multipolar world still holds no guarantee of an end to the wheeling and dealing between big powers. In the post-Soviet international system, George Orwell's Animal Farm still exists, and some are always more equal than the others." -- The uranium export deal received almost no coverage in the U.S. press, except in specialized publications; see here and here, for example. -- A UPI squib was a rare exception.[2] -- The Economic Times (Mumbai, India) reported on the deal on Feb. 2.[3] ...

There was a time when Iran might have believed that a multipolar world order would be just and fair from the point of view of the "suppressed nations." If that notion wasn't shattered long ago, it was surely was last Friday when the director of Rosatom, Russia's federal agency for nuclear power, Sergei Kiriyenko, urgently flew to Washington on a one-day "working visit."

Russia's nuclear czar was rushing to formalize a deal between Russia and the United States that Moscow has been keenly seeking for the past several years. From Washington's point of view, the timing couldn't have been better. Just as it seemed a biting U.N. Security Council sanctions regime against Iran was impossible to achieve, prospects are brightening.

Tehran is not the only capital that must worry if the two heavyweights of the nuclear order begin hobnobbing. Many countries -- such as India and South Africa -- would also be affected by any redrawing of the nuclear fuel trade regime. But it is Iran which is in the firing line.

In Washington, Kiriyenko and U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez signed a trade agreement allowing Russia to incrementally boost enriched uranium exports to the U.S. The deal allows the sale of Russian enriched uranium directly to U.S. utilities.

Previously, such transactions had to be routed through the U.S. Enrichment Corporation, a special intermediary agent, under a conversion program known as HEU-ELU. The discriminatory regime kept Russia out of the highly lucrative enriched uranium trade with the U.S. The HEU-LEU, popularly called the "Megatons to Megawatts agreement," dates to 1993 and stipulates that Russia should convert 500 tons of high-enriched uranium or HEU, which is equivalent to approximately 20,000 nuclear warheads, out of its dismantled Soviet-era nuclear weapon stockpile into low-enriched uranium, or LEU, before converting it into nuclear fuel for use in the US.

The Washington deal means a lot to Russia -- commercially, politically, and strategically. Kiriyenko admitted it is worth US$5-6 billion in commercial terms in the coming five-year period alone. By 2014, one in five American nuclear plants will be running on Russian uranium. The access to the U.S. market enables Russia to fully utilize its uranium enrichment capacity, which stands at 40% of the world total.

The Russian daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta noted that Washington has signaled that "it is interested in expanding cooperation with Moscow in civil nuclear power." According to the U.S. Nuclear Energy Institute, the American market will have a uranium shortage beginning in 2011 so it makes sense for the U.S. to liberalize its market for Russian uranium. According to Rosatom, Russia has 870,000 tons of natural uranium, the world's largest reserves after Australia and Kazakhstan.

Therefore, through Friday's deal, Washington offers a bonanza to Moscow by jettisoning the prohibitive and discriminatory 112% customs duty that has so far kept Russian low-enriched uranium off the U.S. market. The U.S. ban also covered any fuel supply or reprocessing of waste fuel by Russia for U.S.-made nuclear reactors in third countries such as Taiwan or China.

But U.S.-Russia trade is never based on commercial considerations alone; it is highly politicized. In the case of nuclear fuel, it is even more so. Also, nuclear fuel trade impacts the nuclear non-proliferation regime. Russia is planning an international uranium enrichment center in Angarsk, eastern Siberia, which will supply enriched uranium to third countries planning to develop global nuclear energy. Kiriyenko said at the 51st International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) conference in Vienna last September that Russia envisions the Angarsk facility, which will be under IAEA control, as "a step towards establishing the next generation nuclear energy infrastructure."

The facility will also be responsible for the disposal of waste fuel. As Russia's U.N. ambassador Vitaly Churkin pointed out in October, the Angarsk center will be "able to play an important role" in nuclear non-proliferation by "ensuring access to peaceful nuclear energy for all countries complying with their obligations in that realm [Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty]".

Russia had originally mooted the international center as a non-proliferation initiative that could also provide a compromise formula for the Iran nuclear issue. The Russian proposal was first made public two years ago by President Vladimir Putin, who said that the international centers would give countries transparent access to civilian nuclear technology without provoking international fears that enriched uranium could be used for covert weapons programs.

Last Friday's deal underscores U.S. support of the Russian move to create an international cartel for nuclear fuel that strengthens the non-proliferation regime. But the idea of international centers is not as democratic as it sounds. Moscow was recently dismissive of an idea that Angarsk-like facilities could be replicated in Arab countries. Kiriyenko asserted, "We believe there should be a number of such centers, but clearly such centers should be located in countries in full possession of [uranium] enrichment technology, so that the technology does not proliferate around the world."

Clearly, a cartel is in the making in the highly lucrative nuclear fuel trade. And Washington and Moscow are on the same page. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov has been quoted as admitting that any signatory to the NPT had a right to buy enriched nuclear fuel from the international centers, "but this is only in theory. For a variety of reasons, a country may be denied access to uranium."

Russian nuclear experts have acknowledged that the U.S. implicitly associated last Friday's deal in Washington with Russia ceasing nuclear operations in Iran, where it is engaged in the construction of a nuclear power plant in Bushehr. In retrospect, the manifest haste with which Russia fulfilled -- in eight installments during the six-week period since December 16 -- its obligations for supplying low-enriched nuclear fuel totaling 82 tons for the Bushehr plant falls into perspective. Russia completed on January 28 -- barely four days ahead of last Friday's deal in Washington -- its eighth and final delivery of fuel for Bushehr.

Equally, U.S. President George W. Bush took a surprisingly tolerant attitude toward Russian fuel supplies for Bushehr, although Israel and several European capitals took serious exception to Moscow's move as being a direct threat to regional security. To quote a Russian commentator, "Bush all but repeated Vladimir Putin's words to the effect that now that Russia is supplying Iran with nuclear fuel, it will not have to deal with nuclear enrichment itself."

It was a brilliant piece of pragmatism on Bush's part. In essence, he "liberated" Moscow from the "tyranny" of nuclear cooperation with Tehran. But he would now expect Moscow -- in the downstream of the Washington deal on Friday -- to re-calibrate its stance on the need to pressure Tehran through sanctions.

Following the meeting of the "Five+One" in Berlin on January 22, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov outlined that any new resolution on Iran would have certain features:

--"Any actions in the Security Council should be aimed at supporting the IAEA" by taking into account the "progress achieved in the work of the IAEA" and expressing support for IAEA's continued effort to close the questions that still remain clarified."
--Any new measures "ought to be commensurate with the real situation," that is, the Security Council must take into account Iran's readiness to cooperate with the IAEA.
--Door for talks must remain open so long as "Iran accepts the terms set forth by the IAEA."
--"Talks will be dedicated not only to dealing with nuclear issues and not only to ensuring in practice the lawful rights of Iran to develop peaceful nuclear energy, but also to expanding economic cooperation with Iran in the nuclear field and to collaborating with Iran on regional problems, on security problems of this region."
--New resolution will be "principally in the form of calls on all countries to show vigilance" in developing their relations with Iran in the nuclear field.

Lavrov drew satisfaction that "in the end, we have received a text that differs from the initial demands of our Western partners, which actually went along the path of punishing Iran rather supporting the IAEA's efforts."

From available details, the draft U.N. Security Council resolution cleared at Berlin lacked any cutting edge. It contained the following elements:

--Travel ban on Iranians "engaged in, directly associated with, or providing support for Iran's proliferation of sensitive nuclear activities or for the development of nuclear weapon delivery systems."
--Stipulation that the assets freeze detailed in the previous resolution will now include specified persons and entities.
--Advisory that all countries should "exercise vigilance" over activities of their financial institutions with Iranian banks, especially Bank Melli and Bank Saderat.

But Washington is intent on playing the "sanction card" and Western powers ultimately will go along with American wishes. China remains equivocal. Beijing "calls on all parties to step up diplomatic efforts to be creative and seek new approaches to break the deadlock; and achieve a comprehensive solution to the Iran question," to quote the foreign ministry spokesman in Beijing. Now, after Friday's deal in Washington, where does Russia stand?

That is why Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Kislyak's statement posted on the Foreign Ministry website in Moscow on Tuesday becomes intriguing. He says Russia calls on Iran to freeze uranium enrichment until "complicated points have been worked out" by the IAEA. There is a subtle shift in emphasis here. So far, Moscow's accent was on the IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei's report to the Security Council in the third week of February.

The general expectation so far has been that ElBaradei would clarify the outstanding questions about Iran's past nuclear activities. ElBaradei said in an interview with the Kuwait-based daily al-Rai, "Iran has made some breakthrough in [resolving] its nuclear program." But Kislyak says: "I believe this [Iran freezing enrichment] is entirely achievable if the appropriate political decisions are taken. International concerns can be easily allayed [by Tehran] to create more favorable conditions for Iran's extensive cooperation with other countries."

He also plays down Iran's cooperation with the IAEA by saying, "Frankly speaking, our Iranian colleagues could have started this work long ago and not wasted so many years on confrontation, first with the IAEA board of governors, and then with the U.N. Security Council."

Kislyak warns that the new sanctions resolution "contains serious signals for Iran and envisions decisions to expand sanctions earlier adopted by the Security Council." A leading Russian commentator promptly added his voice to Kislayk's by warning the new resolution "may prove to be quite serious" and that Moscow "did not notice [this] at first glance."

Significantly, he adds, "The adoption of the new resolution was continuously delayed because of Russia and China. During this time, [Iranian President Mahmud] Ahmadinejad's team travelled a long way in toughening its stance. As a result, international experts, including Iranian, are in agreement that the Iranian nuclear program had approached a point beyond which it would inevitably result in the development of nuclear weapons. Against this backdrop, mild sanctions in the Security Council were almost encouraging Iran to go ahead."

From the Russian doublespeak, it seems that in addition to the provisions in the draft agreed at Berlin on January 22, no matter what the IAEA chief might come up with, the upcoming resolution might insist that Iran should stop uranium enrichment as a condition for resumption of talks. Tehran will be certain to reject such a pre-condition.

But Iran will be left to realize how a multipolar world still holds no guarantee of an end to the wheeling and dealing between big powers. In the post-Soviet international system, George Orwell's Animal Farm still exists, and some are always more equal than the others.

--M.K. Bhadrakumar served as a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for over 29 years, with postings including India's ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-1998) and to Turkey (1998-2001).

MOSCOW -- Russia says it has signed a new multi-billion-dollar deal to sell enriched uranium to nuclear utilities in the United States.

The agreement signed Friday in Washington is worth as much as $6 billion during the next 10 years, said Sergei Kiriyenko, head of Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear agency, RIA Novosti reported Saturday.

Kiriyenko met with U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman, U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, and chief executives of U.S. energy companies that own and operate nuclear power plants.

The uranium deliveries, to begin in 2011, will encourage bilateral trade in Russian uranium for "peaceful purposes" and help ensure that utilities in the United States have an adequate source of uranium, Kiriyenko told RIA Novosti.

Russia exports uranium to the United States duty free via the United States Enrichment Corporation, a special intermediary agent which accepts uranium from dismantled Russian nuclear weapons.

MOSCOW/WASHINGTON -- Russia and the U.S. have signed a trade deal allowing Russia to increase enriched uranium exports to the U.S., Russian state nuclear agency Rosatom said on Saturday.

"The deal is worth $5-6 billion over the next 10 years," said Rosatom director Sergei Kiriyenko, after signing the document together with U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez.

The deal allows for sales of Russian enriched uranium directly to U.S. utilities. Previously, such direct transactions were not permitted.

Gutierrez said: "The agreement will encourage bilateral trade in Russian uranium products for peaceful purposes. It will also help to ensure that U.S. utilities have an adequate source of enriched uranium for U.S. utility consumers."

A Rosatom spokesman said with the new trade deal the volumes of direct deliveries of uranium enrichment services may total 20 percent of the market.

Under the deal, Russian uranium exports to the U.S. would increase slowly over a 10-year period, beginning in 2011.

In September, the U.S. Court of International Trade lifted discriminatory, anti-dumping restrictions on Russian low-enriched uranium (LEU) supplies, ordering the U.S. Department of Commerce to cancel a 112 percent duty on Russian low-enriched uranium, which is used by U.S. nuclear power plants, within 60 days.

Russia currently exports uranium to the U.S. duty free via the U.S. Enrichment Corporation (USEC), a special intermediary agent, under a conversion program called HEU-LEU.

The HEU-LEU contract, also known as the Megatons to Megawatts agreement, was signed in February 1993 and expires in 2013. It aims at converting 500 tons of high-enriched uranium (HEU), the equivalent of approximately 20,000 nuclear warheads, from dismantled Russian nuclear weapons into low-enriched uranium (LEU), which is then converted into nuclear fuel for use in U.S. commercial reactors.