Canada and China join up on advanced nuclear reactor technology

One of the side benefits of the “monster deal” that made former President Bill Clinton’s Canadian buddy Frank Giustra one of the world’s largest uranium producers in a transaction ultimately worth tens of millions of dollars, is that Communist China indirectly benefits. With Clinton’s help, Giustra is now the proud owner of highly coveted deposits of Kazakhstan uranium that could fuel nuclear reactors. For his role in the deal, Clinton’s charitable foundation received a $31.3 million donation and a public pledge from Frank Giustra to give the William J. Clinton Foundation an additional $100 million.

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Though it will never make New York Times headlines like the Giustra-Clinton deal in Kazakhstan did, as of January 11, 2008 Canada and China are now jointly developing CANDU technologies in China. “Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) and the Nuclear Power Institute of China (NPIC) announce the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on Advanced Reactor Technology Development,” according to an AECL media release dated from Beijing on Jan. 11, 2008. “NPIC is a large research & design institute based in Chengdu of Sichuan Province and affiliated to the China Nuclear Corporation (CNNC). “AECL and CNNC have a proven track record of working together, having successfully delivered two CANDU units under budget and ahead of schedule at the Qinshan Phase 111 site, 125 kilometers south of Shanghai, in cooperation with Chinese and international partners. “AECL’s Vice-President of Marketing and Sales Ala Alizadeh added, “We believe that CANDU nuclear technology is an ideal strategic complement to China’s current nuclear power program.” CANDU reactors have been operating in Canada since 1962, and abroad since 1972. CANDU units have been constructed in North America, South America, Europe and Asia. There are 48 heavy water moderated reactors based on the CANDU design in operation, under construction, or under refurbishment worldwide. AECL is the designer and builder of CANDU technology, including the Advanced CANDU Reactor and the CANDU 6, one of the world’s top-performing reactors. Canada has played a pivotal role in helping rogue nations find their way to nuclear weapons. “Pyongyang netted some $60 million from missile and missile component sales to Iran, Iraq, Syrian and Yemen,” a South Korean study says. “Such exports represent the single largest source of revenue for the Kim Jong Il regime.” “The full story of how the North Koreans have come this far is not yet clear, but no one doubts that Pakistan played a role, trading its nuclear technology for North Korea’s missile-making expertise.” (Asian Pacific Post, Oct. 24, 2002). “Pakistan’s nuclear research has been under the direction of men like Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood and Chaudhry Abdul Majeed. “These fellows got their uranium enrichment expertise courtesy of the Atomic Energy of Canada, and Sultan Mahmood learned his stuff on a CANDU reactor near Karachi. “Sultan and some 50 leading Pakistani nuclear engineers were also trained in Ontario and New Brunswick.” “If you believe AECL’s assertions that the radioactive plutonium that is the raw material for Pakistan’s nuclear bombs did not come from the spent fuel of CANDU reactors, you are being taken for a magic carpet ride.” In October 1995, then AECL President Reid Morden, a former director of the Canadian Security & Intelligence Service (CSIS), helped the all-powerful Canadian Privy Council put together a clandestine CANDU contract with China. A second phase of the CANDU deal with China was signed in Ottawa in 2005 during the controversial and much-protested official Canadian visit of Premier Li Peng. Li Peng and former Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and Morden, along with his counterpart in the China Nuclear Corporation, Jiang Xinxiong, signed documents. AECL and the Canadian government never made clear the precise nature of the second-phase agreement, but Morden stated, “We are now essentially ready to complete work on a commercial contract.” Following the timeline, AECL and the Nuclear Power Institute of China signed their Memorandum of Understanding on Advanced Reactor Technology Development on Jan. 11. Meanwhile, that democratically elected leaders of western nations conduct business that gives nuclear power to a league of rogue nations is troubling. That there was no public outcry for the wife of a former on-the-take president to step out of the running in the US presidential race defies belief.