IAEA/RANF: RUSSIAN PROPOSAL ON ASSURED FUEL SUPPLY

UNCLAS UNVIE VIENNA 000155 SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE FOR T, IO/T, ISN/NESS, ISN/RA DOE FOR NA-243 GOOREVICH, SYLVESTER NRC FOR SCHWARTZMAN E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: AORC ENRG PREL KNNP TRGY RS SUBJECT: IAEA/RANF: RUSSIAN PROPOSAL ON ASSURED FUEL SUPPLY REFS: (A)Wickes-Timbie Email 02/13/09 (B) UNVIE 95 (C) GOV/INF/2009/1 (D) UNVIE 104 (E) UNVIE 154 -------------- SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (SBU) The Russian Government and IAEA Secretariat have the proposal for a nuclear fuel assurance supply mechanism that is nearest to coming before the IAEA Board for action. The arrangement provides for an assured export license, fissionable material, a storage location, and revenue, and on this basis is closer to implementation than other fuel bank concepts. Uncertainty remains on how IAEA Board states will interpret recipient country eligibility - a crucial factor in whether the Board will approve the arrangement. Further questions surround the application of safeguards to the LEU being transferred, what role the IAEA would play once it requests fuel from Russia, and how the supply of LEU will relate to fuel fabrication. For the U.S., we need clarity on whether we can interpret the proposal as consistent with NSG guidelines, in particular the full-scope safeguards requirement, which Russia has implied might not apply (in order to include India). As in the parallel proposal for an IAEA-administered fuel bank, the IAEA will advocate that the DG must be empowered to judge if Board-approved criteria are met and, if so, to transfer Agency-owned LEU on his own authority without involvement by others. End summary. -------------- AN IAEA NUCELAR FUEL RESERVE IN RUSSIAN HANDS -------------- ¶2. (SBU) Refs A-C provide background on the Russian Federation Initiative to Establish a Reserve of Low Enriched Uranium (LEU) for the supply of LEU to the IAEA for its member states. Director General (DG) ElBaradei stated April 8 to the Ambassador (ref E) that he favors using the next two meetings of the Board of Governors, in mid-June and early September, first to increase understanding and buy-in for the arrangement, and then to secure formal approval. The Russian Mission in Vienna informed UNVIE it would conduct outreach to Board states in advance of the June Board meeting, but only after Moscow authorizes the texts of the two operative documents to be circulated by the Agency. This has not happened as of early April; indications are that the Russian Government may not approve release of the texts in time, and that ElBaradei favors holding back the documents past the Board meeting regardless of whether Moscow is willing. Per IAEA fuel assurances point man Tariq Rauf on April 2, ElBaradei remains wary that skeptics on the Board will question the rapid progress from a three-page summary in March to two elaborated legal documents. Feeling he still lacks a clear mandate from the Board to develop and present an arrangement, ElBaradei has proposed instead that Russia present a more detailed summary paper of its own as a basis for further "conceptual" discussion and education of interested parties. The Secretariat awaits Moscow's tactical decision. Russian Msnoff told us April 8 the MFA lead on the issue, IAEA Governor Berdennikov, takes the view the Russia has no more to tell about the arrangement short of releasing the agreement texts; his ROSATOM colleague Ambassador Spasskiy must also be heard from. ¶3. (U) As described in refs, the Russian LEU reserve arrangement would operate through two legal agreements. Agreement 1 sets out a Russian Federation undertaking to maintain a reserve of LEU at its international enrichment center in Angarsk, for transfer to IAEA ownership under certain circumstances and conditions. Russia would in effect donate to the Agency its costs for holding and managing the special fissionable material in reserve, for the contingency that the IAEA would effect a transfer. Agreement 2 would be a model transfer agreement the IAEA would sign with a member state that is experiencing a politically-motivated cut-off of LEU fuel for a civilian nuclear power plant reactor and which has exhausted other sources (i.e., commercial and state-to-state) for LEU procurement. IAEA nuclear energy department official Alan McDonald praises the Russian arrangement in particular for "solving" what he sees as the tallest hurdle to nuclear fuel supply assurance - the guarantee of an export license. Moreover, he points out, Russia accepts that the IAEA would re-transfer LEU without requiring the recipient state to commit that it will not separately acquire uranium enrichment capability. With known material in a known location and arrangements for revenue to flow from the acquiring state through the IAEA to the Russian source, the proposal is, in McDonald's assessment, closer to being implementable than any other multilateral "reliable access to nuclear fuel" (RANF) proposal in which the IAEA would be involved, including its own (the NTI-supported fuel bank). ¶4. (SBU) As IAEA officials (Tariq Rauf, EXPO; Wolfram Tonhauser, nuclear and treaty law adviser; Alan McDonald, nuclear energy department) briefed to T Special Assistant Timbie (Ref A, based on February conference call with UNVIE and Russian mission personnel participating),Agreement 1 between Russia and the Agency will allow the Agency to call upon Russia to make LEU available in the event a country has its fuel supply cut off, requests LEU, and enters into Agreement 2 with the Agency. Agreement 2, between a recipient country and the Agency, would apply a "model agreement" previously approved by the Board that authorizes the DG, under specified conditions, to effect a delivery of LEU to a specific country for a specific power reactor without going to the Board for case-specific approval. Rauf stressed that Agreement 2 would have all the nonproliferation and safety obligations necessary, and that both agreements 1 and 2 would state the applicable pricing formula. The recipient country would have to sign such an agreement and deposit payment into an Agency account before the DG would request the LEU from Russia. Rauf did not discuss how the LEU would be made into fuel. ¶5. (U) During the February telcon Rauf said the Agency does not believe it a good idea to require a recipient state to have an Additional Protocol (AP) in force as an eligibility criterion under the Russian proposal. He said that if member states were to push for this, we would lose on universalization of the AP as well as the fuel bank. Russian Mission First Secretary Mikhail Kondratenkov said the AP was not a requirement for Russia. However, Rauf raised Agency concern about how Agreement 1 and 2 would work with NSG guidelines. He said the Agency still felt that it needed to be able to provide LEU according to the Statute, meaning to any member state in compliance with its Agency obligations. -------------- ELIGIBILITY - MOSCOW'S INDIA-INCLUSIVE VIEW -------------- ¶6. (U) Ref B relates Russia's release of a three-page summary document (published to IAEA Member States as ref C) and the commentary it elicited from member states and the DG under "Any Other Business" on the concluding day of the March Board meeting. After the March Board, Russian Msnoff Kondratenkov told us the Russian MFA had tried to word its Agreement 1 with the IAEA in such a fashion as not to require Duma approval of the document, although Russian law requires Duma approval of each civil nuclear export agreement. He added that relevant Russian law is "practically based on" and does not exceed NSG Guidelines/limitations on transfers. Russia did not want with this agreement to "create a limitation on NSG guidelines." (NOTE: We understood him to mean "erode" or "undercut" them. END NOTE.) We saw a copy of draft Agreement 1, which still had language in italics that tracked closely with the sentence in REF C authorizing transfer of LEU to "any non-nuclear-weapon state" having an "agreement with the IAEA requiring the application of safeguards on all its peaceful nuclear activities." Kondratenkov agreed this phrase could be read as allowing transfers to civil facilities in India under its separation plan. (NOTE: In an unrelated conversation with MsnOff, safeguards legal adviser Laura Rockwood expressed concern that India might not place under indefinite safeguards all civil facilities identified in its separation plan. That possibility raises the question of whether India's safeguards "requires" application of safeguards to "all its peaceful nuclear activities." END NOTE.) Subsequently, on April 8 Kondratenkov told us the IAEA had accepted the "non-nuclear weapons state" formulation. The draft Agreement 1 we saw in March further sets out recipient state conditions: -- No use of LEU received from the IAEA for weapon purposes, explosions, and "any military purpose" -- Physical protection per INFCIRC 225, Rev. 4 -- LEU may be used only for production of energy. Safety standards and measures for handling, shipping, and storage to be per INFCIRC 18, Rev. 1 -- No re-export, further enrichment, or reprocessing of spent fuel unless agreed to by the IAEA Kondratenkov said these provisions, which he characterized as "minimal conditions consistent with the NSG," were "practically agreed" between the IAEA and Russia. -------------- THE WAY FORWARD -------------- ¶7. (U) Kondratenkov, when asked about the way ahead, offered the following timeline of events: -- Russian IAEA Governor Berdennikov's oral statement under AOB at the March Board will be circulated as an INFCIRC (done); -- Agreement 1 needs to be concluded between Russia and IAEA (done); -- Moscow must receive a letter from the DG affirming agreement of the Agreement 1 text in full. Upon receipt of that letter, the Russian inter-agency process would ensue to approve agreement outside Duma process. (Done - Kondratenkov affirmed April 8 that this review is under way but would likely not be complete in time for the June Board meeting.) -- Agreement 2 needs to be finalized by IAEA, involving further "informal" consultation between IAEA and Moscow. (Done, per Kondratenkov on April 8.) -- In early May, texts of Agreements 1 and 2 would be presented in all Board capitals. Russia would undertake targeted outreach, especially with "skeptics" - Egypt (will oppose eligibility for non-NPT signatories),Cuba, Brazil and Argentina, the latter two being the hardest. ¶8. (SBU) Our IAEA contacts McDonald and Rauf tell us this timeline on the last point is slipping on the Russian side. Moreover, ElBaradei has written to the Russians with the proposal that, in place of the two agreement texts as finished documents, for purposes of information and confidence building in the June Board the Russian Federation should circulate a detailed summary of the arrangements, including key legal points in each agreement. The IAEA would characterize this document as describing a "model" under discussion with Russia. The Russian Mission tells us that IAEA Governor Berdennikov and ROSATOM's Spasskiy will decide on ElBaradei's tactical proposal. Despite his caution at this juncture, DG ElBaradei did affirm to the Ambassador his aim of September Board approval for the agreement texts (ref E). -------------- WHAT WE STILL NEED TO KNOW -------------- ¶9. (SBU) Comment: Based on the information in the Russian summary document (ref C) and separate conversations with Russian officials after the March Board meeting a number of questions need to be answered in the run-up to the June Board: Would arrangements for fabricating LEU, stored in the form of UF6, into power reactor fuel assemblies be specified as part of these agreements, or would they be addressed separately? UNVIE understanding thus far is that fuel fabrication is not addressed in the Russian proposal. Would the supply of LEU to India be consistent with the NSG Guidelines or require some modification? Would the United States support such a modification? Would the United States read the Indian safeguards agreement as clearly "requiring" safeguards on all its declared civil facilities? Is India prepared to define itself "in" under the Agreement 1 criterion? How can advocates persuade the skeptical states that would have no need of a "last-resort" supplier of LEU to acquiesce in the establishment of a facility desired by other developing countries? Would the proposed Russian arrangement, as outlined in REF C, establish any unhelpful precedents in relation to the NTI fuel bank, the U.S. national reserve, or model arrangements envisioned under the 2006 RANF proposal? Mission is continuing consultations with Russian and Indian counterparts, Secretariat staff, and other member state missions as appropriate on these questions. SCHULTE