WMD Terrorism News

CBR Weapons and WMD Terrorism News- September 25, 2006

1. FBI is Casting a Wider Net in Anthrax Attacks

“Five years after the anthrax attacks that killed five people, the FBI is now convinced that the lethal powder sent to the Senate was far less sophisticated than originally believed, widening the pool of possible suspects in a frustratingly slow investigation. The finding, which resulted from countless scientific tests at numerous laboratories, appears to undermine the widely held belief that the attack was carried out by a government scientist or someone with access to a U.S. biodefense lab. What was initially described as a near-military-grade biological weapon was ultimately found to have had a more ordinary pedigree, containing no additives and no signs of special processing to make the anthrax bacteria more deadly, law enforcement officials confirmed. In addition, the strain of anthrax used in the attacks has turned out to be more common than was initially believed, the officials said.” (Washington Post, 25Sep06, Allan Lengel and Joby Warrick)
http://www.washingtonpost.
com/wp-dyn/content/article
/2006/09/24/AR2006092401014.html


Feds, locals probe powder found among bank payments

“Workers at a southeast Denver bank discovered two open capsules of yellow powder inside a bill payment envelope Sunday, setting off a daylong hazardous materials investigation involving a small army of federal and local law enforcement officers. Investigators determined that the powder was not anthrax or a weapon of mass destruction. A series of tests indicated that the powder was a complex protein, but Champagne said additional tests would be needed today to identify the substance.” (Rocky Mountain News, 25Sep06, Myung Oak Kim)
http://www.rockymountainnews.com
/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_1
5_5018969,00.html


Mock disaster exercise

“With an eye to the sky for a possible actual weather emergency, Marshall County's first responders worked their way through a mock disaster drill Saturday morning. With severe weather a distinct possibility later in the day, emergency personnel across the county convened Saturday morning in Centennial Park to play out a scenario designed to test their communications and knowledge of the National Incident Management System,or NIMS. Volunteers served as victims in the mock drill, which saw a helicopter crash in the middle of the Marshall County Blueberry Festival's primary vendor area. The crash occurred after a passenger had dumped a white powdery substance over the crowd. That substance, in the drill, was later ‘confirmed’ as deadly anthrax [bacteria].” (South Bend Tribune, 24Sep06, Anita Munson)
http://www.southbendtribune.com
/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060
924/News01/609240325/-1/NEWS01


Bioshield dispute underscores problems with defense program

“Five years after anthrax attacks left five dead, sickened 17 and terrified America, millions of vaccine shots developed through cutting-edge genetic engineering were supposed to be filling a new national stockpile of biodefense drugs. Instead, the nearly $1 billion contract awarded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to a tiny and struggling San Francisco Bay area biotechnology company is plagued with misfortune and delays. Delivery has been put off until at least 2008 - and maybe later - while the government and VaxGen Inc. trade barbs over who is at fault for the delays. The dispute has further tarnished Project BioShield, a government program that has alienated many potential biodefense contractors.” (Contra Costa Times; 23Sep06; Paul
Elias, AP)
http://www.contracostatimes.co
m/mld/cctimes/news/state/1559
0349.htm

Saddam Hussein Thrown Out of Court Again

“Saddam Hussein's stormy trial on genocide and other charges has resumed in Baghdad. The trial was in session just two hours before the former Iraqi leader was thrown out of court - again. Defendant Saddam Hussein told the presiding judge he did not want to be kept in a courtroom cage anymore. His demand annoyed chief judge Mohammed Oreibi al-Khalifa, who ordered Saddam removed from the court. Saddam's defense lawyers were
already staging a boycott of the court session to protest last week's removal of the previous chief judge for failing to be neutral.” (Voice of America, 25Sep06, Jim Randle)
http://voanews.com/english
/2006-09-25-voa16.cfm

180 Countries Now Uphold the Chemical Weapons Ban: The Central African

Republic Ratifies the Chemical Weapons Convention “The Central African Republic will become the 180th State Party to the Chemical Weapons Convention on 20th October 2006. This will happen 30 days after it deposited its instrument of ratification of the Chemical Weapons Convention with the Secretary-General of the United Nations on 20 September 2006. The Convention now covers 98% of the global population.” (Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, 25Sep06)
http://www.opcw.org/
pressreleases/2006/PR63_2006.html

The OPCW [Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons] Hosts the UN Disarmament Fellows

“The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons held a two-day seminar for the United Nations Disarmament Fellowship on 21 and 22 September 2006 at its Headquarters in The Hague as a part of continuing disarmament education effort. The Fellowship numbers 30 Fellows in this year, representing Argentina, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Chile, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Georgia, Guinea, India, Iran, Japan, Latvia, Liberia, Libya, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mexico, Myanmar, Nepal, Russian
Federation, Sierra Leone, Slovakia, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, Syria, Turkey, United States of America, and Zimbabwe. The Fellows received an extensive briefing in all aspects of the implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), the global chemical weapons ban, by all 179 CWC States Parties.” (Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, 25Sep06)
http://www.opcw.org
/pressreleases/2006/PR62_2006.html

OPCW Director-General Attends Seventh U.N. High-Level Meeting

“On 22 September 2006, the Director-General of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Ambassador Rogelio Pfirter, attended the Seventh High-Level Meeting with Regional and Other Governmental Organisations, hosted in New York by United Nations Secretary-General, H.E. Mr Kofi Annan. The focus of this year’s meeting related to proposals for cooperation between the United Nations and regional organizations on ‘How Regional and Other Intergovernmental Organizations Can Help Solve Current and Long-standing Regional Crises: Capacity to Prevent, Respond and Rebuild after Crises’.” (Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, 25Sep06)
http://www.opcw.org/
pressreleases/2006/PR61_2006.html

NIAID [National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases] Awards
$4 Million to Develop Anti-Radiation Treatments

“The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has issued five awards totaling $4 million to fund the development of products that eliminate radioactive materials from the human body following radiological or nuclear exposure. The awards, which were granted under Project Bioshield authorities, complement NIAID’s other medical countermeasure efforts to create safe and effective products of this type. ‘These new grants will help identify new drug candidates that could be acquired by the strategic national stockpile of medical countermeasures, which is available to the public after a terrorist or nuclear attack or accidental radioactive exposure,’ says NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, M.D.” (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 25Sep06)
http://www.nih.gov
/news/pr/sep2006/niaid-25.htm

Officials say Staten Island park radiation is not dangerous

“A Staten Island park where high levels of radium were discovered last year poses no public health risk, officials said Friday, though a congressman is asking for the full list of 79 other radiological ‘hot spots’ around the city. National Park Service and Environmental Protection Agency officials met with Staten Island's Rep. Vito Fossella a day after a government report revealed that an aerial survey conducted by anti-terror experts had detected radium at Great Kills Park. The survey was conducted in August 2005 at the request of the NYPD to create a map of low-intensity sources of radioactivity.” (Staten Island Live; 22Sep06; Devlin Barrett, AP)
http://www.silive.com/
newsflash/metro/inde
x.ssf?/base/news-20/1
158965079240500.xml&storylist=simetro


Russia agrees to take 2.3 tons [of] Serbian nuclear reactor waste

“Russia agreed to take 2.3 metric tons of spent fuel from a decommissioned Serbian nuclear reactor, in a measure aimed at ensuring the waste does not end up in terrorist hands, a Serbian official said Monday. A US$10 million deal to the transport about 8,000 spent fuel rods from the Institute of Nuclear Sciences in Vinca, just outside Belgrade, to Russia was signed last week in Vienna, Austria, at an International Atomic Energy Agency conference, Serbia's Science Minister Aleksandar Popovic said. The rods are varying degrees of enrichment~a potential dirty bomb material. A recent IAEA inspection of the Vinca facility has discovered that spent fuel was kept in poorly guarded storage areas, triggering fears that they could be a potential theft targets for the terrorists.” (Pravda, 25Sep06)
http://english.pravda.ru
/news/world/25-09-200
6/84653-reactor-0

Combating Nuclear Terrorism: Federal Efforts to Respond to Nuclear
and Radiological Threats and to Protect Emergency Response Capabilities
Could Be Strengthened

“DOE has unique capabilities and assets to prevent and respond to a nuclear or radiological attack in the United States. These include specialized teams to search for, locate, and deactivate nuclear or radiological devices and to help manage the consequences of a nuclear or radiological attack. These capabilities are primarily found at DOE’s two key emergency response facilities—the Remote Sensing Laboratories at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, and Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. DOE’s two Remote Sensing Laboratories are protected at the lowest level of physical security allowed by DOE guidance because, according to DOE, capabilities and assets to prevent and respond to nuclear and radiological emergencies have been dispersed across the country and are not concentrated at the laboratories. However, we [GAO] found a number of critical capabilities and assets that exist only at the Remote Sensing Laboratories and whose loss would significantly hamper DOE’s ability to quickly prevent and respond to a nuclear or radiological emergency.” (U.S. Government Accountability Office, 21Sep06)
http://www.gao.gov/n
ew.items/d061015.pdf

Russia’s Upper House of Parliament Ratifies Global Treaty Aimed to
Prevent Nuclear Terrorism

“Russia’s upper house of parliament on Monday ratified a global treaty aimed to prevent nuclear terrorism, the Associated Press news agency reports. The International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism ‘is the first universal agreement to be adopted by the United Nations on Russia’s initiative, intended to prevent terror attacks with the use of weapons of mass destruction,’ the Interfax news agency quoted Mikhail Margelov, chairman of the chamber’s international affairs committee, as saying. The treaty makes it a crime to possess radioactive material or weapons with the intention of committing a terrorist act or to damage a nuclear facility.” (MosNews, 25Sep06)
http://www.mosnews.com
/news/2006/09/25/nonuketerror.shtml

Committee hopes to decrease risks of airplane threats

“The possibility of a new infectious disease health scare every year combined with the potential of a chemical or biological threat to the nation's airplanes has some Purdue researchers concerned. In 2001, the National Research Council cited airborne allergens, carbon monoxide, hydraulic fluids and pesticides amongst top concerns. Because of the increase of public regard of chemical and biological attacks as well as the concern for airborne illness contamination, the Federal Aviation Administration enacted a committee in 2004, which includes seven universities and one national lab, said Q. Yan Chen, principal director of the committee and professor of mechanical engineering. The Air
Transportation Center of Excellence for Airline Cabin Environment Research is composed of Purdue and Harvard as technical co-leads. Since the enactment of the committee and with over $2 million in grant money already gifted to research at Purdue, nine studies including better methods of modeling airflow, effectively estimating contaminant transfer in an air cabin and composing a compact and cost-effective sensor have already begun, said Chen.” (The Exponent, 25Sep06, Manda Ramirez)
http://www.purdueexponent
.org/index.php?module=a
rticle&story_id=2135

Homeland Security Bill Is More Style Than Substance, Analysts Say

“Eager to showcase fresh votes on national security before the fall elections, Congress has loaded a $34 billion homeland security spending bill with measures to beef up defenses at the nation's borders, ports and chemical plants and to revamp its disaster management. With few exceptions, however, the measures are less sweeping than they appear, analysts said. On ports, the Senate recently voted to install radiation detectors by the end of next year at the 22 biggest ports, which get 98 percent of inbound cargo; add 1,000 customs agents; and start a pilot program at three foreign ports to scan for nuclear or ‘dirty bomb’ materials in U.S.-bound cargo. But…lawmakers have not agreed to fund all the proposals. Similarly, negotiators from the Senate and House homeland security panels announced a tentative deal Thursday to give DHS authority to enforce security rules for high-risk chemical plants. But Democrats and environmental groups said the pact is filled with loopholes sought by industry…” (Washington Post, 24Sep06, Spencer S. Hsu)
http://www.washingtonpost.com
/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/
09/23/AR2006092300909.html

Meade [Ft. Meade, Maryland]: 22 members will respond in event of attack

“Equipped with a mobile laboratory, communication center and various experts, a recently certified team from Fort George G. Meade is now available to respond to major threats and help protect citizens in the event of a weapons of mass destruction attack in Maryland. The U.S. Department of Defense certified a Weapons of Mass Destruction Civil Support Team Thursday to help emergency personnel and first responders handle weapons of mass destruction incidents. Based at Fort Meade, the 22-member team consists of National Guard troops trained to handle biological, chemical, radioactive and nuclear incidents.” (The Capital, 23Sep06, Joshua Stewart)
http://www.hometownannapol
is.com/cgi-bin/read/2006/09_23
-18/TOP