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Saudi US Rift widening
goldandsilverlinings
Back when Egypt was falling apart, not that it still isn’t, the Saudi king was very upset with the US for allowing his good friend Hosni Mubarak to fall. Rumor has it that the King almost or in fact did suffer a heart attack after talking to Obama about the way things were going in the Egypt.
The Saudi’s are now raising concerns that the Bushehr reactor is another Fukushima waiting to happen. The US is turning a blind eye to Saudi Arabia’s concerns, granted the Saudi’s are likely taking advantage of Fukushima to draw attention to their objective of halting Bushehr coming online. Israel has also been very quiet on Bushekr Read more…
Iran to build new nuclear research reactors-report
TEHRAN, April 11 (Reuters) – Iran plans to build “four to five” nuclear research reactors and will continue to enrich uranium to provide their fuel, a nuclear official said on Monday despite Western pressure on Tehran to curb atomic work.
The head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation, Fereydoon Abbasi, said Tehran would build the reactors “in the next few years” to produce medical radioisotopes, according to the students news agency ISNA.
“To provide the fuel for these (new) reactors, we need to continue with the 20 percent enrichment of uranium,” ISNA quoted him as saying.
Abbasi’s remarks are likely to deepen Western fears that Iran’s atomic work is aimed at Read more…
Critical U.S. Infrastructure at Risk of Cyber Attack, Experts Warn
AP
Oct. 26: The reactor building of the Bushehr nuclear power plant in Iran.
Just as the computers that ran Iran’s nuclear program were sabotaged and crippled by a cyber “super worm” virus, the software used to run much of America’s industrial, transportation and power infrastructure — including nuclear power plants and major airports — is vulnerable to cyber attack, and two software companies have revealed dozens of successful hacks to prove it.
The issue lies in specialized software systems sold by Siemens, Iconics, 7-Technologies and others to power plants and other infrastructure. Called “supervisory control and data acquisition” systems, or SCADA, they run software solely for industrial use.
And it’s just as vulnerable as every other program on your Read more…
Malaysia Seen as Possible WMD Transport Hub
Malaysian Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein on Monday said his country was probably used as a midshipment point for the illicit movement of WMD materials, The Star newspaper reported (see GSN, March 18).
“It is safe for me to say that Malaysia is likely being used as a transit point and not as a destination point for WMD,” Hishammuddin said.
Authorities in the Southeast Asian state last week announced they had seized two containers from a Malaysian-flagged ship that were filled with technology that could have applications in the building of nuclear weapons. Reports indicated the vessel was heading from China to Iran.
“It will take us some time to identify the equipment, what it can be used for and to Read more…
Chávez’s purchase of $15 billion in weapons causes concern in Latin America
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez’s purchases of weapons totaling more than $15 billion causes concern in Latin America.
With the acquisition of hundreds of tanks, helicopters and bulletproof vehicles as well as submarines and missile networks, Venezuela is arming itself at a speed unprecedented in the history of the South American country.
Experts consulted by El Nuevo Herald have said that Hugo Chávez’s has created unrest in the region with purchases to expand its military that total more than $15 billion.
The analysts warned that the purchases are made in an improvised fashion, following a “dubious” process with no bidding or prior studies, which could lead the country to acquire a Russian technology difficult to adopt and rejected by segments of the National Armed Forces.
The funds Chávez is using for the purchase of these new weapons, the largest in the nation’s history, are in Read more…
Syrian-bound Iranian plane forced to land in Turkey
(AFP)
DIYARBAKIR, Turkey — An Iranian cargo plane en route to Syria has been forced to land in Turkey’s southeastern Diyarbakir airport for an inspection, security forces said on Sunday.
The plane, a civilian Ilyushin, landed on Saturday night on the orders of the Turkish authorities. Military fighter planes were on standby in case the plane refused to comply.
An inspection of the plane is on-going to check whether the aircraft has any illicit or military material on board, security sources added.
Turkish authorities forced another Syrian-bound Iranian plane to land in Diyarbakir on Wednesday last week.
After a search lasting several hours, the plane was found to be Read more…
Secret Iran Gold Holdings Leaked: Tehran Holds Same Amount Of Gold As United Kingdom, And Is Buying More
While it will not come as a major surprise to most, according to senior BOE individuals and Wikileaks, Iran, as well as Qatar and Jordan have been actively purchasing gold well over the amount reported to and by the IMF, in an accelerated attempt to diversify their holdings away from the US dollar. “Iran has bought large amounts of gold in the international market, according to a senior Bank of England official, in a sign of how growing political pressure has driven Tehran to reduce its exposure to the US dollar. Andrew Bailey, head of banking at the Bank of England, told an American official that the central bank had observed “significant moves by Iran to purchase gold”, according to a US diplomatic cable obtained by WikiLeaks and seen by the Financial Times.” The reason for Tehran’s scramble into gold: “an attempt by Iran to protect its reserves from risk of seizure”. The misrepresentation of Iran’s holdings could be so vast that Iran could possibly be one of the largest holders of goldin the world. “Market observers believe Tehran has been one of the biggest buyers of bullion over the past decade after China, Russia and India, and is among the Read more…
Oil Should Spike Higher Following Saudi Riots and Nigerian Elections in April
The following special report on oil (LA Blog Only, leverageacademy.com/blog) discusses the oil market, providing reasons to be bullish on the commodity given unrest in the Middle East, Nigerian elections in April, and rising domestic consumption in oil producing countries, including Venezuela, Nigeria, and Iran. According to the article, the rise of oil prices could easily cause the next recession. In 2010, soft commodities outperformed energy, but that will certainly change given the political headwinds abroad and continued monetary easing in the developed world. Therefore, the Bernanke “Put,” combined with political unrest will be to blame for continued sharp price increases in the energy commodity sector.
Emerging market demand, especially in China, which now consumes nearly 10mm barrels of oil per day, will also be driving the demand side of the equation. Money supply in China was also up 19.7% in 2010, because of the rapid Read more…
U.S. might be giving away sensitive military technology, report finds
Sensitive military technology might be slipping into enemy hands, in part because of a dramatic decline in the number of foreign workers that the Commerce Department screens, federal auditors have found.
For national security purposes, the United States controls the export of so-called dual-use technologies — items that have both civilian and military uses, including computer security tools — to countries of concern, including Iran and North Korea.
One way to restrict the transfer of such technology is for Commerce to screen visa applications from foreign nationals who wish to work in U.S. high-tech companies.
But the Commerce Department, the agency responsible for checking visa applications to identify potential unlicensed exports, is not screening thousands of those forms, according to a Government Accountability Office report released on Monday.
Reduced visa application vetting is one of several factors that “may indicate the continuing risk that foreign nationals could gain unauthorized access to controlled technology,” the auditors wrote.
Commerce checked only 150 visa forms in fiscal 2009, a dramatic drop from Read more…
Middle East Unrest Could Harm WMD-Free Zone Talks
Protesters chant slogans on Saturday during a demonstration outside an Egyptian state security building in the outskirts of Cairo. Recent political instability throughout the Middle East could complicate efforts to establish a regional weapons of mass destruction-free zone, current and former officials said (Wissam Nassar/Getty Images).
The unrest and revolutions sweeping through the Middle East have raised doubts over the potential for regional nations to hold previously planned talks focused on forming a weapons of mass destruction-free zone, Arms Control Today reported in its March issue (see GSN, March 1).
At the 2010 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty review conference in New York, member nations agreed to hold a 2012 meeting on “the establishment of a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction.”
“We are absolutely committed” to the WMD-free zone meeting, White House WMD point man Gary Samore said in an interview last month. “But there’s a lot of uncertainty because of the unrest in the Middle East.”
In the last two months, longstanding regimes in Tunisia and Egypt have fallen, and protests in Libya have escalated into full-scale fighting between militants and forces loyal to Col. Muammar Qadhafi. Protests have also erupted in Bahrain, Jordan, Oman and Read more…
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