Nuclear Issues

Air Vice Marshall (Ret.) of the Indian Air Force and Fellow at Harvard's Asia Institute, Dr. Arjun Subramaniam spoke at the Future of Diplomacy Project with its Faculty Director, Nicholas Burns about the intricacies of the India-China relationship.

Nuclear energy powerhouse Westinghouse Electric Co. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on 29 March, with its parent company Toshiba writing off more than $6 billion in losses connected to its US businesses. Westinghouse was engaged in negotiations to build six AP1000 nuclear reactors in India as part of the landmark US-India civilian nuclear agreement. The bankruptcy filing raises fresh questions, not just about the fate of the reactors, but also about the future of the nuclear deal.

In this installment of “Conversations in Diplomacy," the Future of Diplomacy Project's Executive Director, Cathryn Clüver, speaks with Ambassador Syed Akbaruddin,India's Permanent Representative to the United Nations.

Leading up to and during the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit, Belfer Center experts released reports, published commentary, and provided insight and analysis into global nuclear security. In advance of the Summit, the Project on Managing the Atom set the stage for discussion with the report Preventing Nuclear Terrorism: Continuous Improvement or Dangerous Decline?

An in-progress compilation of the expert commentary and analysis is available here.

Minister Khurshid addressed a crowd of students, faculty and guests at the Harvard Kennedy School as part of the India & South Asia Program’s international speaker series, co-sponsored by Harvard’s South Asia Initiative. His comments on Tuesday, October 1, 2013, followed a series of meetings at the United Nations in New York.

Nuclear terrorism remains a real and urgent threat. Despite an array of mechanisms established to combat this threat, several serious problems persist, requiring relentless attention and actions by the United States, Russia and other responsible nations. These problems include continuing nuclear security vulnerabilities in a number of countries and the continued incidents of illicit trafficking in nuclear materials, radioactive sources and the various components.

This new report, “Steps to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism: Recommendations Based on the U.S.-Russia Joint Threat Assessment,” was produced jointly by researchers at Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies (ISKRAN). The study outlines concrete steps for the United States and Russia to take in leading international efforts to combat the threat of nuclear terrorism.

When President Barack Obama hosted nearly 50 heads of state in Washington, D.C. for the first global Nuclear Security Summit in 2010, the Belfer Center made available to the leaders and their sherpas a range of relevant background materials and information. With the arrival of the 2012 Seoul Nuclear Security Summit, the Center created www.nuclearsummit.org – an online Nuclear Security Summit dossier.

China and India's simultaneous rise weighs closely on the destiny of Southeast Asia, writes Belfer Center International Council member Anindya Barkie. Their cooperation would benefit all surrounding neighbors; their contensions could tear the region apart.

Associate Professor of Public Policy and Project on Managing the Atom Co-Principal Investigator Matthew Bunn provides a comprehensive assessment of global efforts to secure and consolidate nuclear stockpiles, and a detailed action plan for securing all nuclear materials in four years.  Securing the Bomb 2010 was commissioned by the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI). The full report, with additional information on the threat of nuclear terrorism, is available for download on the NTI website.