Russia Wants Faster Aid
for 'Rotting' Nuclear Subs
By Mark Trevelyan
BERLIN (Reuters) - Russia faces grave
environmental and terrorist threats unless donors accelerate a slow
trickle of international aid for dismantling its rusting nuclear
submarines, a senior official said.
Deputy Atomic Energy Minister Sergei
Antipov said Russia would raise its concerns next month at a meeting
of the Group of Eight (G8) leading nations in the United States.
He said Moscow was very worried at the slow rate of funding, despite
a much-trumpeted G8 initiative at a 2002 summit in Canada to spend
$20 billion over 10 years to secure stockpiles of nuclear, chemical
and biological materials.
"The longer a submarine remains without being scrapped and without
the nuclear fuel being removed... the more danger for the
environment, the greater the risk of these materials falling into
the hands of terrorists or other groups for malicious purposes,"
Antipov said in an interview.
"Any of the submarines -- and we
have 96 waiting to be scrapped -- could sink. Any of them could
rust through or break up. Anything could happen," he told Reuters
in Berlin, where he attended a 14-nation meeting on the issue last
week.
The submarines are decommissioned vessels of the former Soviet
fleet, some of which "have been rotting at their piers for several
decades," Antipov told parliament last November.
Dismantling them involves removing
the highly radioactive reactor compartment, hermetically sealing
it to prevent leakage, and eventually transferring it to be stored
for decades at a special site which Russia is building, with
German help, in the northern region of Murmansk.
DILUTING THE AID
Antipov said Moscow
was concerned about some talk among G8 members of extending the
$20 billion program to cover more countries, diluting the funds
available in Russia itself.
"It's reasonable to
ask the question: if we can't help just one country effectively,
is there any point in extending efforts to others? The lion's
share of all the dangers, as far as nuclear materials are
concerned, is situated in Russia.
"We (also) have a huge problem with
stocks
of chemical weapons, on which this money is also to be spent. If
the money isn't spent here but in Iraq or Nigeria or Ukraine, then
solving the security problems in Russia will be put back."
Antipov said a large
proportion of the promised aid money was being spent ineffectively
by donors in their own countries on "various experts, trips and
discussions."
"It's a well known problem, it
always arises with international aid. We understand they can't
help spending some of this money at home because this work has to
be organized. But the question is what proportion -- 10, 20 or 60
percent?
"Ten to 20 should probably be the upper limit but there are actual
facts today to show our partners are spending up to 60 percent at
home," he said.
As a result, only about $100
million had been spent directly in Russia in the first two years
of the 10-year, $20 billion plan, he said -- about half on the
submarine program and the rest on securing stocks of chemical
weapons.
The United States is due to host
the next G8 summit next month. The group also includes Canada,
Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Russia.
05/16/04 05:42
