FYI - rhetoric and reality, Bob. Keep track of the difference and you will understand what's going on better. Too bad CNN is doing everything it can to hype up the "Oh my God, it's all going to fall apart!" line.
Put it this way, I am closer to the action than any other poster I know on SI and I am not concerned. Paying attention, but still sleeping well.
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To: Bob Biersack (3756 )
From: Dale Baker ( Ignore ) Friday, Mar 26 1999 2:46PM ET
Reply # of 3771
Yes, let's compare what some folks thought would happen with reality:
--Sophisticated Yugo air defense system means inevitable casualties, maybe serious. REALITY: Apart from one F-15 with engine problems, every plane came home without a scratch. Serbs are missing about 5 Mig-29's so far.
--Crazed Russian pan-Slav types will rush themselves, their weapons and their fanatical devotion to Serbia to defend their brethren. REALITY: Russian foreign minister gives a press conference saying oops, we didn't mean it, and by the way could the IMF sign the next check for us, please?
--And my favorite - Milosevic is holding back his anti-aircraft weapons so they get their best shot at NATO planes later on. REALITY - only Slobo knows but maybe he just doesn't want them to get BLOWN INTO LITTLE PIECES every time they turn on the "On" switch.
I could go on, but everyone should get the point by now.
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U.S., Russia Sign Uranium Deal
Filed at 1:26 a.m. EST
By The Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Russia's anger at the United States over the bombing in Yugoslavia apparently is muted when it comes to rescuing a uranium deal that could yield as much as $12 billion to the financially beleaguered country.
Only hours after NATO forces began their attacks in Yugoslavia, prompting outrage from Moscow, Russia and the United States quietly signed an agreement aimed at salvaging the multibillion dollar uranium deal that ran run into trouble in recent months.
Energy Secretary Bill Richardson and Russia's minister of atomic energy, Yevgeny Adamov, toasted the agreement with champagne Wednesday night in a ceremony at the Energy Department, officials confirmed Friday. The signing was given no advance publicity.
Earlier that day, NATO missiles and aircraft began attacking Yugoslavia over strong Russian protests. Only the day before, Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov canceled his trip to Washington in midflight because of the impending NATO airstrikes.
The uranium deal is a key part of the Clinton's administration's nuclear nonproliferation efforts. To Russia, the agreement worth $12 billion over 20 years means access to badly needed hard currency.
The agreement ''will facilitate the conversion of highly enriched uranium from dismantled Russian nuclear weapons into fuel for U.S. nuclear reactors,'' an Energy Department statement said.
A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the signing occurred at all signals the importance both governments place on it.
The agreement is part of a complicated arrangement reached in 1993 between the United States and Russia for the sale of 550 tons of Russia's highly enriched uranium, used in nuclear weapons, to the United States.
About 40 tons of Russian weapons-grade uranium, diluted so it can be used in civilian reactors, already has been shipped to the United States. But in recent months the program has foundered with Russia threatening to stop further shipments.
''Since December it's been dead in the water,'' said a U.S. official who attended Wednesday's ceremony.
As the deal is structured, Russia sends diluted weapons-grade uranium to the private United States Enrichment Corp., which pays Russia, then sells the now low-enriched uranium to utilities for use in power reactors.
Part of the deal has Russia taking ownership of the natural uranium that the Russian highly enriched uranium replaces. Because of a glut in the uranium market, the Russians have been unable to sell the natural uranium at the price they anticipated and have stopped shipping diluted highly enriched uranium as agreed in 1993.
The new agreement includes a commitment by the United States to take 22,000 tons of natural uranium off the market, while Russia agrees to stockpile some uranium. Congress last year provided $325 million to begin the purchases.
With the agreement in place and the government stockpiles propping up uranium prices, three Western companies went forward this week to commit to buy much of the natural uranium Russia is expected to obtain from sale of the weapons-grade uranium, officials said.
The companies -- Cameco Corp., of Canada, the world's largest uranium producer; Cogema of France; and Nukem Group of Germany -- announced a 15-year commercial agreement with Tenex, the commercial arm of Russia's atomic agency, for the purchase of 130,000 tons of natural uranium.
The companies had agreed in principle in 1997 to buy Russia's natural uranium derived from the highly enriched uranium deal but backed out after the uranium market became glutted and prices fell.
Only after the United States agreed to buy some of the natural uranium and agreed with Russia to stockpile large amounts for 10 years was the commercial agreement again possible, U.S. officials and executives of Cameco said. |
