Iran
Iran’s top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani on Tuesday held talks with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier about the row over Tehran’s contested nuclear programme.
Africasia 5th June 2007
Iran’s nuclear program cannot be stopped, and any Western attempt to force a halt to uranium enrichment would be like playing “with the lion’s tail,” President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday.
Guardian 5th June 2007
Channel 4 News 5th June 2007
Republican candidates for U.S. president agreed on Tuesday that Iran must not develop atomic weapons even if a tactical nuclear strike is needed to stop it and accused Democrats of being soft on the issue.
Reuters 5th June 2007
Russia
Russia has signed a nuclear co-operation agreement with the Ukraine.
World Nuclear News 5th June 2007
New nukes
Skills shortages could wreck the government’s nuclear-reliant energy policy, the union for scientists and engineers has warned.
Personnel Today 6th June 2007
New investment in nuclear power and renewable energy may not materialise because the government has failed to understand the needs of investors, a group of energy experts is warning. In a report to be published today, the UK Energy Re-search Centre, a government-backed academic group, argues that ministers show signs of continuing to believe that there is a Central Electricity Generating Board that can be directed to follow policy objectives. In Britain’s highly competitive and fragmented electricity industry, the academics argue, the government’s objectives depend on the private sector taking decisions to invest tens of billions of pounds, which will not necessarily be forthcoming.
FT 6th June 2007
EDF set out an energy strategy for the UK for 2020 which included only one nuclear station. And analysts UBs said that there was likely to be a new boom in gas-fired stations because nukes take so long to build.
Daily Mail 5th June 2007