How Disagreements Over Russia’s Nuclear Threats Could Derail the NPT Review Conference
Jamie Kwong | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Members of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), also known as the ban treaty, met June 21-23 in Vienna for the treaty’s first meeting of states parties. As the first formal gathering since the treaty entered into force in 2021, the meeting set the course for implementing the treaty’s bans on nuclear weapons and related activities and its positive obligations on victim assistance and environmental remediation. The meeting also shed light on what to expect at the second, highly anticipated nuclear meeting of the summer: the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference.
US Envoy Says Latest Iran Nuclear Talks Were ‘Wasted Occasion’
Golnar Motevalli and Yasna Haghdoost | Bloomberg
Iran rejected at talks last week the “very detailed outlines” of an arrangement the US was willing to accept to revive the 2015 nuclear accord, a top US diplomat said. Robert Malley, the US Special Envoy for Iran, told National Public Radio that recent negotiations in Doha amounted to “more than a little bit of a wasted occasion.” Efforts to restore the nuclear agreement, which limited Iran’s atomic work in return for sanctions relief, are hanging by a thread. The contours of a deal were drawn at multi-party talks in Vienna but progress stalled in March as the US and Iran disagreed on whether and when to ease penalties not directly linked to the nuclear pact, which then-President Donald Trump exited in 2018.
Ukraine Says Link Restored to Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Station
Reuters
Ukraine’s nuclear power operator said on Friday it had re-established its connection to surveillance systems at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, Europe’s largest, which is occupied by Russian forces. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N.’s atomic watchdog, has said it wants to inspect the plant in southern Ukraine urgently, but Ukrainian authorities oppose any such visit while Russian forces remain in control. It was the second time communications had been lost with the plant, made up of six reactors.
IAEA Working With Australia on Safeguards for Nuclear Subs: Grossi
World Nuclear News
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is already working with Australia on the “complex” issue of ensuring nuclear safeguards in relation to its proposed acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines under the trilateral AUKUS partnership, the organisation’s Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said today. Speaking to ABC news after meeting with Foreign Minister Penny Wong on the first day of his visit to Australia, Grossi said Australia is a non-nuclear weapon state with firm non-proliferation commitments, but safeguarding nuclear material used for naval propulsion is complex because IAEA inspectors are unable to check such material for long periods of time when a vessel is at sea. Verification of the presence of the safeguarded material must be reconciled with the confidentiality of military operations.
ROK Military Chief Says North Korean Nuclear Test Unlikely During Monsoon Season
Jeongmin Kim | NK News
North Korea is unlikely to conduct a seventh nuclear test during heavy seasonal rains, the outgoing head of South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) told reporters on Tuesday. Won In-choul made the assessment ahead of a handover ceremony on Tuesday, after President Yoon Suk-yeol tapped Army Gen. Kim Seung-kyum for the top military position earlier this week. “It’s monsoon season in North Korea and there’s heavy rain there, so it wouldn’t be easy to immediately conduct a nuclear test,” Won said Tuesday, the defense ministry confirmed to NK News.
Experimental Missile Warning Satellite Will Test Tech for Space Force Use in Multiple Orbits
Theresa Hitchens | Breaking Defense
When it goes up into orbit today, the Space Force’s experimental Wide Field of View (WFOV) Testbed satellite will test new infrared sensor capabilities aimed at detecting and tracking hypersonic missiles — and helping to work out the technological kinks for the service’s flagship Next-Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared (Next-Gen OPIR) constellation, according to program officials. But the effort also will provide lessons and technologies that could be reproduced by the service’s other missile warning/tracking programs with satellites in different orbits, Space Force and industry officials told reporters at a pre-launch briefing June 28.