The Council for a Livable World, with a cover letter from Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley,  today delivered a petition signed by 12,357 people urging “significant troop withdrawal beginning July of no less than 30,000 troops.” Senator Merkley stated…

IRAN
Iran deputy foreign minister resigns amid pressure
Ali Akbar Dareini, AP – June 21, 2011
Iran’s newly appointed deputy foreign minister has resigned under pressure from hardliners who view him as part of a movement seeking to weaken the role of Iran’s powerful Muslim clerics, reports say. The dispute over Mohammad Sharif Malekzadeh is part of a burgeoning power struggle involving President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the parliament and the country’s clergy. While Malekzadeh faces corruption charges, the opposition to his appointment appeared more ideological.

Iran shipping line charged in US over arms
Kara Scannell, Financial Times – June 20, 2011
New York authorities have filed criminal charges against an Iranian shipping company they accuse of trafficking weapons, along with several companies and people who allegedly used multiple corporate aliases to evade US economic sanctions that ban dealings with US financial institutions. The 317-count indictment, filed by the New York County district attorney’s office, is aimed at disabling Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, Iran’s largest maritime shipping company. US officials allege it is a conduit for Iran’s ballistic missile programme and the main facilitator of its procurement activities.

Iran frees jailed human rights activist
AFP – June 21, 2011
TEHRAN — Iran has freed human rights campaigner Emadeddin Baghi after he served a year-long jail term on charges of spreading “propaganda against the regime,” Arman daily reported Tuesday, quoting his lawyer. The award-winning journalist was arrested on December 28, 2009, a day after opposition supporters took to the streets in a new round of protests against the controversial June 12 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Iran’s nuke chief critiques IAEA
George Jahn, Associated Press – June 20, 2011
VIENNA (AP) — A top Iranian official told the International Atomic Energy Agency on Monday to focus on nuclear safety rather than “baseless and marginal issues” — an expression of unhappiness with attempts to probe charges that Tehran wants nuclear arms. Fereidoun Abbasi’s comments to a high-level meeting on improving nuclear safe practices reflected Iran’s dissatisfaction with IAEA chief Yukiya Amano for making the Iran investigation a top priority of the agency. It contrasted sharply with other statements on the opening day of the conference that were restricted to the meeting’s agenda — tightening and improving nuclear safety in the wake of Japan’s Fukushima nuclear disaster.

NORTH KOREA
North Korea recruits hackers at school
Sangwon Yoon, Aljazeera – June 20, 2011
As South Korea blames North Korea for a recent slew of cyberattacks, two defectors share their experiences, as a hacker and trainer of “cyberwarriors” in the reclusive communist country, with Al Jazeera shedding some light into the inner workings of the North’s cyberwarfare programme. In the process, Kim Heung-kwang and Jang Se-yul also warn of the regime’s concentrated efforts to bolster its cyberwarfare capabilities.

Defectors report N.Korea jail abuse
Straits Times – June 21, 2011
SEOUL – A GROUP of 14 North Korean defectors on Tuesday filed a petition with South Korea’s human rights watchdog over abuses they allegedly suffered in two North Korean prisons, a spokesman said. The petition comes as Seoul’s National Human Rights Commission collects cases of human rights violations in the communist state as part of a campaign to improve rights conditions in the North.

North Korea ‘buys anti-riot gear from China’
Lucy Williamson, BBC News – June 21, 2011
North Korea has bought large amounts of anti-riot equipment from China in recent months, South Korea’s main news agency says. This was apparently to prepare for possible unrest in the country, it said. The Yonhap news agency said Pyongyang had created a special police force; it had also considered buying flak jackets and other anti-riot equipment. The United Nations says North Korea is facing severe food shortages.

AFGHANISTAN
Obama to Announce Plans for Afghan Surge Pullout
Mark Landler and Helene Cooper, New York Times – June 20, 2011
WASHINGTON — President Obama plans to announce his decision on the scale and pace of troop withdrawals from Afghanistan in a speech on Wednesday evening, an administration official said Monday. As he closes in on a decision, another official said, Mr. Obama is considering options that range from a Pentagon-backed proposal to pull out only 5,000 troops this year to an aggressive plan to withdraw within 12 months all 30,000 troops the United States deployed to Afghanistan as part of the surge in December 2009.

Risks of Reversing the Afghanistan Surge
David E. Sanger, New York Times – June 19, 2011
WASHINGTON — In the 18 months since President Obama ordered a surge of 30,000 troops into Afghanistan, he has scaled back, time and again, Washington’s goals in a country that the British, the Soviets and ultimately the Americans tried, and failed, to change. Now, as he enters the last few days of decision-making about how fast to bring those surge troops home, that relentless narrowing of objectives has boiled down to one central measurement: Whether Al Qaeda is capable of again mounting an attack on the United States from Afghanistan, the origin of the 9/11 attacks, or from the nearby mountains of Pakistan.

DEFENSE SPENDING
Senate Panel Authorizes Nuclear Stockpile, Nonproliferation Funding
Global Security Newswire – June 20, 2011
The Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday approved legislation that authorizes funding for various U.S. nuclear stockpile and nonproliferation operations. The fiscal 2012 defense authorization bill covers Defense Department spending and the Energy Department’s national-security activities. It allows for certain expenses, but actual funding amounts are included in separate appropriations bills.

RUSSIA
Obama Extends National Emergency on Russian Nuke Material
Global Security Newswire – June 20, 2011
President Obama has ordered a one-year extension of the U.S. national emergency first declared in 2000 over Russian atomic material suitable for use in nuclear weapons. Obama submitted a notice of the extension for publication in the Federal Register.

IRAN
Iranian Company Charged With Tricking U.S. Banks
Jo Becker, New York Times – June 20, 2011
An Iranian government-owned shipping line that the United States believes is integral to Iran’s efforts to obtain banned technology for its nuclear and missile programs has illegally funneled tens of millions of dollars in financial transactions through the American banking system over the past three years, evading sanctions by cloaking itself in corporate alter egos and falsifying records, according to an indictment that the Manhattan district attorney plans to unseal on Monday.

IRAN: Detained American hikers to be tried on 2nd anniversary of their arrest
Ramin Mostaghim, LA Times – June 20, 2011
Two American hikers taken into custody in 2009 on charges of espionage for crossing into Iran from Iraqi Kurdistan are to stand trial July 31, the second anniversary of their arrest, their lawyer said Monday. Berkeley grads Joshua Fattal, Shane Bauer and Sarah Shourd were arrested by Iranian forces after allegedy crossing into  Iran during a hiking trip. Shourd was later released on $500,000 bail in September 2010, and continues to fight for Fattal and Bauer’s freedom.

Iran FM threatened with impeachment
Farhad Pouladi, AFP – June 19, 2011
TEHRAN — A number of Iranian MPs threatened on Sunday to impeach Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi for appointing an aide to the president’s underfire chief of staff as one of his deputies. Salehi on Saturday appointed Mohammad Sahrif Malekzadeh as a deputy foreign minister in charge of administrative and financial affairs. Malekzadeh was a top official in the high council of Iranian affairs abroad, run by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, whom ultra-conservatives accuse of aiming to undermine the Islamic regime.

Gates: Iran supplying arms to Iraqi Shiite groups
AP – June 19, 2011
WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Robert Gates says Shiite extremists, not al-Qaida terrorists, are to blame for most of the recent U.S. military deaths in Iraq, and they’re “clearly getting some fairly sophisticated and powerful weapons” from Iran. Gates tells CNN’s “State of the Union” that he’s worried about the Iranian influence in Iraq and he thinks Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is beginning to take these Shiite groups seriously.

NORTH KOREA

‘No need for tactical nukes on peninsula’
Song Sang-ho, Korea Herald – June 20, 2011
USFK commander says timing of Seoul’s defense reform efforts is ‘right.’ U.S. Forces Korea commander Gen. Walter Sharp said Monday that tactical nuclear weapons do not need to be redeployed here, underscoring the U.S. security commitment to South Korea. With the North continuing to launch military provocations, some here have raised the need to station U.S. nuclear weapons here, all of which were withdrawn after the two Koreas adopted a joint declaration on the denuclearization in 1991.

US predicts more North Korea strikes
Mark Willacy, ABC News – June 20, 2011
The commander of United States forces in South Korea has warned the communist North is likely to launch more military strikes against Seoul. Tensions have been rising on the Korean peninsula over the past month. The commander of the 28,000 US troops stationed in South Korea, General Walter Sharp, has told a forum in Seoul that North Korea is likely to launch military attacks against the South. But he says Seoul and Washington are better prepared to counter the threat.

UN official calls for North Korea aid
AFP – June 17, 2011
SYDNEY — A senior United Nations official on Friday called for urgent aid to North Korea, pleading with international donors to overlook political difficulties in the face of a humanitarian crisis.

Valerie Amos, head of the UN Office of Coordination for Humanitarian Affairs, said of the estimated US$210 million needed to confront dire food shortages in the communist state, only about 15 percent had been pledged.

UNITED STATES
U.S. Pressing Its Crackdown Against Leaks
Scott Shane, New York Times – June 17, 2011
WASHINGTON — Stephen J. Kim, an arms expert who immigrated from South Korea as a child, spent a decade briefing top government officials on the dangers posed by North Korea. Then last August he was charged with violating the Espionage Act — not by aiding some foreign adversary, but by revealing classified information to a Fox News reporter. Stephen Kim, an arms expert, is accused of violating the Espionage Act by giving classified information to a reporter. Mr. Kim’s case is next in line in the Obama administration’s unprecedented crackdown on leaks, after the crumbling last week of the case against a former National Security Agency official, Thomas A. Drake.

AFGHANISTAN
Lashing Out, Karzai Says U.S. Is Talking to the Taliban
Rod Nordland, New York Times – June 18, 2011
KABUL, Afghanistan — President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan said publicly for the first time on Saturday that the United States and the NATO-led coalition have been actively negotiating with the Taliban, an assertion he made in a speech that he also used to fire a broadside against his coalition allies. Mr. Karzai denied earlier reports — including some based on his own statements — that his government was negotiating with Taliban leaders, but he said the Americans were doing so.

Few Taliban Leaders Take Afghan Offer to Switch Sides
Alissa J. Rubin, New York Times – June 19, 2011
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Toor Jan, who used to kill Americans and Canadians here, does not want much from the Afghan government. A home. A job. And, yes, eight security guards. He needs them. As one of the few Taliban commanders to switch sides, he is a target. Toor Jan’s switch may represent a hopeful sign for the government’s plan to reintegrate the Taliban into Afghan society — but it is also a rarity. Of the 1,700 fighters who have enrolled in the 10-month-old program, only a handful are midlevel commanders, and two-thirds are from the north, where the insurgency is much weaker than in the south, said Maj. Gen. Phil Jones, the director of a NATO unit that is monitoring the program.

IRAN
Medvedev calld for Iranian cooperation in nuclear dispute
Global Security Newswire- June 16, 2011
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Wednesday called on his Iranian opposite to offer better cooperation in the years-old dispute over the Middle Eastern state’s contested nuclear program.

Iran launches second satellite into orbit, claims state TV
Julian Borger, Guardian- June 16, 2011
Western officials say Rasad-1 could be used to high-resolution maps, but the move prompts concern over Iranian nuclear ambitions.

NORTH KOREA
Is it time to give up on the Six-Party Talks?
Evan Ramstad, Wall Street Journal- June 14, 2011
There’s been a fascinating discussion happening in Seoul this week over the future of nuclear energy, weapons and technology on the Korean Peninsula. The three-day Asan Plenum on the nuclear future turned especially provocative Tuesday morning when some prominent American participants said it’s time to give up on the diplomatic process called the six-party talks.

PAKISTAN
Pentagon says US must salvage relations with Pakistan to protect nukes, regional security
Associated Press- June 16, 2011
The U.S. must keep working to salvage its relationship with Pakistan in order to preserve security in the region and protect against potential proliferation of that country’s nuclear weapons, top Pentagon leaders said Thursday.

DEFENSE SPENDING
Gates concerned by House cuts in nuclear funds
Xavier Briand, Reuters- June 15, 2011
Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Wednesday he was very concerned about plans in the House of Representatives to cut $1 billion from funding to upgrade nuclear weapons infrastructure.

Lockheed’s anti-missile system targeted for cits in U.S. Senate
Roxana Tiron, Bloomberg- June 15, 2011
U.S. senators are aiming to eliminate funding for a missile defense program being developed by Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT) in collaboration with Italy and Germnay.

NATO
Europe is urged to upgrade weapons
Ciaran Giles, Boston Globe- June 17, 2011
NATO’s Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said yesterday that he was worried about the low level of defense spending among European allies and called on members to work together to reduce the reliance on the United States for high-tech weapons.

GLOBAL ZERO
The growing appeal of zero
Economist- June 16, 2011
Ridding the world of nuclear weapons has long been a cause of the pacifist left. But in the past few years mainstream politicians, retired military leaders and academic strategists have begun to share the same goal, albeit with a very different idea of how to get there.

IRAN

Ahmadinejad’s Fall, America’s Loss
Suzanne Maloney and Ray Takeyh, New York Times- June 15, 2011
The Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is being sidelined by religious fundamentalists, and it’s bad news for American officials seeking to halt Iran’s nuclear program. The same Iranian leader who dabbled in Holocaust denial and messianic fantasies was, paradoxically, also the theocracy’s most ardent advocate of direct nuclear negotiations with Washington. As Mr. Ahmadinejad falls out of favor with Iran’s hard-line religious leaders, the prospect of a nuclear deal between Tehran and Washington is diminishing.

Iran To Step Up Uranium Enrichment
Voice of America- June 15, 2011
Despite multiple United Nations Security Council resolutions calling on Iran to stop enriching uranium, the Iranian government has announced plans to triple its capacity to enrich uranium to 20 percent.

Iran Postulates First Nuclear Test
Jamsheed K. Choksy, Forbes- June 14, 2011
Media outlets and blogs in Israel, England, and the U.S. have responded with considerable incredulity to claims by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) of sanguine reactions if Iran tests an atom bomb. The IRGC’s scenario underscores an unfortunate reality, however.

Nuclear Proliferation: Engaging Iran
Richard Dalton, Steen Hohwii-Christensen, Paul con Maltzahn, Guillaume Metten, Francois Nicoullaud, and Roberto Toscano, LA Times- June 9, 2011
As ambassadors to Iran during the last decade, we have all followed closely the development of the nuclear crisis between Iran and the international community. It is unacceptable that the talks have been deadlocked for such a long time.

NORTH KOREA

US satellite images capture new buildings at North Korea nuclear plant
Julian Ryall, Telegraph- June 14, 2011
The discovery of the new buildings has sparked concern that they may be part of a drive by Pyongyang to fabricate fuel for nuclear reactors or to enrich uranium.

North Korea likely can miniaturize nuclear device: Seoul
Jack Kim, Reuters- June 13, 2011
North Korea has probably succeeded in miniaturizing a nuclear device, South Korea’s defense minister said on Monday, an advance that would in theory allow the hermit state to place an atomic warhead on a rocket.

UNITED STATES

Nuclear Bomb Refurbishment May Alarm Russia, Imperil Obama Plan
Viola Gienger, Bloomberg- June 16, 2011
A U.S. Air Force plan to refurbish aging nuclear bombs deployed in five European countries would increase the weapon’s power and accuracy and risks re-igniting tensions with Russia, an arms control group says.

House panel whacks funding for nuclear complex
Walter Pincus, Washington Post- June 16, 2011
Led by Republicans, lawmakers are cutting into the funds that the Obama administration had pledged for upgrades and modernization.

MISSILE DEFENSE

Czechs, Disliking Role, Pull Out of U.S. Missile Defense Project
Judy Dempsey and Dan Bilefsky, New York Times- June 15, 2011
The Czech Republic announced Wednesday that it was withdrawing from plans to participate in the United States missile defense program out of frustration at its diminished role in the system, which was conceived as a deterrent against a potential threat from Iran.

COMPREHENSIVE TEST BAN TREATY

Ghana ratifies comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty
Afrique en ligne- June 16, 2011
(PANA) On Wednesday, Ghana became the 154th nation to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, the Vienna-based Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive  Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) said.