[en] Over 25 years ago, INFCE studied the evaluation methodology of proliferation resistance. Recently, INPRO and GEN-IV coordinated by the IAEA and the USDOE respectively seek an appropriate innovative fuel cycle system for next generation that is furnished safer, sustainable, economical and reliable features. The evaluation methodology of the proliferation resistance is also assigned as an essential part of both studies. The IAEA established and has been strictly implementing the verification measures with accurate material accountancy system from the early of the 1970s in order to detect diversion of plutonium that is individually separated from irradiated nuclear material and recycled as MOX fuel. This paper firstly identifies the impedibility of intrinsic features of innovative fuel cycles and the safeguardability of selected nonproliferation measures as two individual essential parameters for evaluation of a proliferation resistance capability. As a next step, this paper also shows methodological considerations in evaluating the proliferation resistance levels as a multiple model of several clusters that are identified the ability of each parameter. (author)

[en] In U-Pu co-denitration area at Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant (RRP), Plutonium Inventory Measurement System (PIMS) and Temporary Canister Verification System (TCVS) are installed to provide efficient and effective safeguards. PIMS measures Pu quantity inside pipes and vessels installed in glove boxes by total neutron counting method. PIMS consists of total 142 neutron detector attached on the wall and top of glove boxes and neutron count rates of each detectors are related to each other to calculate Pu quantity of each process areas. In this moment, inactive calibration using Cf-source was completed. On the other hand, TCVS measures Pu quantity of canisters inside temporary storage by coincidence counting method and it will be installed before the active test. These systems have monitoring function as additional measures. This paper describes specification, performance and measurement principles of PIMS and TCVS. (author)

[en] It was at the former Semipalatinsk Test Site where for the first time in the world the nuclear weapons testing infrastructure elimination was put into practice. Fundamentally new procedures for blasting operations have been developed by specialists of the Kazakh State Research and Production Center of Blasting Operations (KSCBO), National Nuclear Center of the Republic of Kazakhstan (NNC) and Degelen Enterprise to enhance reliability and provide safety during elimination of various objects and performance of large-scale experiments. (author)

[en] IAEA safeguards provide a technical means of verifying that political obligations undertaken by States party to international agreements relating to the peaceful uses of nuclear energy are being honored. The Agency assures the international community that States party to Safeguards Agreements are complying with their undertaking not to use facilities and divert nuclear materials from peaceful uses to the manufacture of nuclear explosive devices. The task of IAEA safeguards can be summed up as to detect diversion of nuclear materials committed to peaceful uses of nuclear energy, or the misuse of equipment or facilities subject to certain safeguards agreements, and to deter such diversion or misuse through the risk of early detection. This lecture concentrates on the factors the Agency takes into account in designing and implementing safeguards approaches at facilities. (author)

[en] This contribution to SCK-CEN's annual scientific report 2003 describes latest developments regarding the MEDOC process (MEtal Decontamination by Oxidation with Cerium). This technique has been applied to decontaminate and recycle materials resulting from the dismantling of nuclear facilities

No abstract available

[en] The fight against the terrorism needs to better control the nuclear materials traffic. A nuclear physic laboratory of the Cea is developing a non destructive method of detection, which can be used in any type of good. The detector is based on the use of an electron beam. (A.L.B.)

[en] The idea for a treaty to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons to more countries was supported unanimously by the UN General Assembly in 1961. The NPT permits the P-5 to have nuclear weapons. All other NPT signatories are 'non-nuclear-weapon States' who are prohibited from acquiring nuclear weapons. To gain their signatures, the NPT promises assistance to them in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and negotiations toward nuclear disarmament. Besides the P-5, the treaty now has 184 countries that have promised not to have nuclear weapons and that have agreed to accept inspections by the IAEA to verify that they are carrying out their promises. However, India, Pakistan, and Israel refused to join the treaty, and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) withdrew from it. Of these four countries, only India and Pakistan have tested nuclear weapons. Israel and North Korea are assumed to have them. The non-proliferation regime today includes much more than the NPT. The IAEA standards for inspection were the next most important element. The IAEA inspection requirements negotiated in the early 1970s were shown to be inadequate by Iraq's success in hiding its nuclear-weapon efforts before and during the Gulf War of 1991. The Additional Protocol of 1997 is slowly replacing these requirements, but, as of December 2004, was in effect in only 62 NPT member countries. The regime includes the agreements creating nuclear-weapon free zones in Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia, the South Pacific, and Mongolia. The countries that formed these zones are also members of the NPT. The regime includes suggestions for standards and financial assistance plus requirements for physical protection of nuclear material from theft by terrorists or others. These efforts range from the Convention on Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, to the technical assistance provided by the IAEA and some countries, to the financial assistance offered by the G-8 and some other IAEA members to countries that need assistance in order to provide better security for nuclear material in their possession, to an April 2004 Security Council resolution that requires countries having nuclear materials to protect them in various ways from being acquired by 'non-State actors' such as terrorists. The regime includes prohibitions on testing such as the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty and the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. The first prohibits nuclear weapons tests everywhere but underground, and the second will prohibit them even underground if it goes into force. For the large majority of NPT members not having nuclear weapons, these treaties contribute to non-proliferation not just by inhibiting testing but by reducing the discrimination inherent in the NPT between those permitted to have nuclear weapons and those not so permitted. These members see an agreement to stop testing by the P-5 as a step of compliance by the P-5 with their NPT promise to cease the nuclear arms race, reduce their nuclear weapons and move toward nuclear disarmament. The regime includes 'no-first-use promises' by the P-5 to other NPT members, usually called 'negative security assurances.' All of the P-5 but China have stated some exceptions to these promises. (The US exception permits use of nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear-weapon NPT member if it attacks another non-weapon NPT member while the attacker is in alliance with a State having nuclear weapons. Recently, the United States asserted another exception by saying it might use nuclear weapons to counter a biological or chemical attack.) The regime includes promises by the P-5 that some protection will be provided to other NPT members in the event of a threat of attack, promises called 'positive security assurances.' The P-5 have promised to seek immediate UN Security Council orders providing security assistance to any NPT member not having nuclear weapons if it is threatened with attack by another nation's nuclear weapons. For allies of some of the P-5, allies not having nuclear weapons, there are stronger assurances: promises of military help if an ally is attacked or threatened with attack, promises made, for example, to NATO allies. The regime includes various multilateral institutions such as the IAEA, the UN Security Council, the periodic NPT Review Conferences, and the UN General Assembly First Committee which considers non-proliferation recommendations for General Assembly adoption. An important but not sufficiently effective element of the regime is the Nuclear Suppliers' Group. Mohamed ElBaradei has recommended a much stronger requirement, and the G-8 agreed in June of 2004 not to export any uranium enrichment or plutonium separation technology for a year. However, gaining widespread agreement to deny the technology useful for enriching uranium and separating plutonium to any country not now having it will not be easy. The NPT recognized an 'inalienable right' to develop and use nuclear energy 'for peaceful purposes without discrimination,' even for NPT members that had agreed not to acquire nuclear weapons, so long as they did not make nuclear weapons. The enrichment and separation technologies can be used for making weapons as well as for fueling peaceful nuclear reactors. And, some NPT members not having nuclear weapons have argued that they have an 'inalienable right' to acquire these technologies. How this problem will be solved is not yet clear, but it must be if the non-proliferation regime is to survive. The regime is seriously challenged today. It needs strengthening-including this and other steps if it is to continue to be effective

[en] Five years ago, member States of the global Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) agreed on a number of forward-looking elements for non-proliferation and disarmament and for the peaceful uses of nuclear technology. This was widely hailed as a major accomplishment for the global nuclear non-proliferation regime and for multilateral cooperation in this context. The NPT regime - a brainchild of the Cold War era - seemed strengthened and better adapted to meet the challenges of the 21st Century. The elements were contained in the Final Document adopted by consensus of the 187 States parties at the 2000 NPT Review Conference, the sixth such Conference since the NPT's entry into force in 1970. Among 62 references to IAEA safeguards in the Final Document, the Agency's verification system was acknowledged as a fundamental pillar of the nuclear non-proliferation regime, one that plays an indispensable role in the Treaty's implementation and helps to create an environment conducive to nuclear disarmament and to cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. The NPT States recognized that IAEA safeguards provide assurance of compliance and assist States In demonstrating compliance with their relevant undertakings. They recognized the IAEA as the competent authority responsible for verifying and assuring compliance with safeguards agreements, and expressed its conviction that nothing should be done to undermine its authority in this regard. Member States having concerns regarding non-compliance with safeguards agreements were called upon to direct such concerns, along with supporting evidence to the Agency for its consideration. The Final Document also supported steps for strengthening the IAEA's safeguards system and for the possible application of IAEA verification in the context of future nuclear disarmament. In the past few years, some widely publicized nuclear issues have highlighted the IAEA's vital verification work in the context of the NPT. This article deals with new developments over the past five years related to these verification challenges, from the IAEA's policy perspective

[en] Thailand has joined all key international treaties and conventions as the international and regional instruments to prevent nuclear or other radioactive materials for National and International Nuclear Security under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Regime. (author)