With global eyes on the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the White House signed an accord with Chile to help the South American country develop a nuclear energy program. The accord was protested by indigenous activists.
Despite the Fukushima nuclear disaster, Obama’s 2012 budget calls for an additional $36 billion in loan guarantees for new nuclear power plants. Obama last week called nuclear power an “important part” of his energy agenda.
Even as the world is gripped by the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, Russia announced it will build a reactor in neighboring Belarus—where large areas still remain closed off due to the 1986 Chernobyl meltdown.
Despite a temporary construction moratorium in the wake of the Fukushima disaster, China is still planning to move ahead with an ambitious thrust of nuclear development—with a new generation of supposedly “safe” reactors.
Power was restored to the control room of the No. 3 reactor at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant—but smoke has been rising intermittently from the reactor building, and elevated radiation is now detected in Tokyo’s water supply.
Yemen’s Parliament enacted several emergency measures at the request of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in an effort to end anti-government protests—but opposition lawmakers rejected the vote as illegal and fraudulent.
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in Cairo that the UN Security Council resolution authorizing a no-fly zone in Libya is “not time-limited,” while rebel leaders in Paris pledged a “democratic, secular” post-Qaddafi regime.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned of “an exchange of blows” after a bus blast in Jerusalem and new rocket attacks on Beersheba. The attacks came a day after new Israeli air-strikes on the Gaza Strip.
Syrian security forces killed 15 people in the city of Deraa, witnesses and rights activists said. Seven were killed when security personnel fired on a group of protesters that gathered after dawn prayers outside al-Omari mosque.
As air-strikes continue on Libya, Tripoli accused both Allied forces and the rebels of breaking a ceasefire—but rebel sources said Qaddafi’s troops continued to attack their western enclave of Misurata, with atrocities against residents.
Israeli warplanes launched air-strikes on targets across the Gaza Strip, injuring at least 17 people including seven children—hours after Hamas pledged to commit to a truce if Israel stops bombarding the Strip.
Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalif announced that “a foreign plot” against the small Gulf state has been foiled, while opposition leaders charged that Washington had given the regime a “green light” for repression.
