Russia votes to accept foreign nuclear waste

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

Russia votes to accept foreign nuclear waste
  
MOSCOW, Dec 21 (Reuters) - The Russian parliament on Thursday passed 
a bill to accept foreign nuclear waste for storage and reprocessing, 
bringing angry condemnation from environmentalists. 

The State Duma, the lower house of parliament, voted 320-30 with 
eight abstentions in favour of the bill, which advocates say could 
earn $21 billion for cash-strapped Russia. 

International conservation group Greenpeace said the bill meant 
Russia would become the world's nuclear dumping ground and that the 
potential danger was too high a price to pay. 

"This vote means the bill only needs the President's signature. The 
country can now be turned into the world's nuclear waste dump," 
Greenpeace nuclear expert Tobias Muenchmeyer told Reuters by 
telephone from Germany. 

"Many nations intend to send nuclear fuel to Russia. Some openly 
state it, for others it is too politically sensitive." 

Muenchmeyer said Greenpeace had made public in March a Ministry of 
Atomic Energy white paper saying Russia could make $21 billion from 
storing and reprocessing foreign nuclear waste. 

It said many European and Asian countries wanted to export waste to 
Russia, including Switzerland, Germany, China and Japan. 

Alexander Kotenkov, the Kremlin's representative in the Duma, said 
profits on imports would allow Russia to invest in its own crumbling 
waste-storage infrastructure. 

"If an ecological catastrophe does happen...it will happen because of 
the poor storage of our fuel," Kotenkov said in televised comments. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle					Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100   				    	
Director, Technical				Extension 2306 				     	
ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Service		Fax:(714) 668-3149 	                   		    
ICN Pharmaceuticals, Inc.			E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net 				                           
ICN Plaza, 3300 Hyland Avenue  		E-Mail: sperle@icnpharm.com          	          
Costa Mesa, CA 92626

Personal Website: http://sandyfl.nukeworker.net
ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com

************************************************************************
The RADSAFE Frequently Asked Questions list, archives and subscription
information can be accessed at http://www.ehs.uiuc.edu/~rad/radsafe.html