Showing posts with label nuclear power. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nuclear power. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Party Leaders Merge, Berlusconi's Position Strengthened

The National Alliance party, founded by the political heirs of Benito Mussolini, has united with Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom Party. This move comes as Gianfranco Fini, 57, the former of the NA party has tried to legitimize the former NA party and rid them of their fascist ties. Analysts also believe that Fini is putting himself in a position to try and succeed Berlusconi, who is 72.
There has said to be tension amongst Fini and Berlsuconi, as Fini has said he wants a strong voice in the party. He also hopes the unification will strengthen the country as a whole.
"Berlusconi knows that his strong and recognised leadership can in no way become a personality cult. We must guarantee that People of Freedom is not the party of one person, but of one country," said Fini.
As of this week Berlusconi has an approval rating in the country around 58%. The opposition party has fallen apart in the last month and pose no soon threat to Berlusconi's power.

Italy (Andrew Johnson)

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Venezuela wants to work with Russia on nuclear energy: Chavez

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/venezuelarussiaenergynucleardiplomacy

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced on Sunday, after a meeting with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev, that he was interested in working with Russia to develop a civilian nuclear power program.

Chavez made the announcement in an almost child-like fashion, feeling the need to immediately clarify that the nuclear energy would be used for "peaceful ends of course -- for medical purposes and to generate electricity."
The fact that he assumes that WE assume he might be using this power for anything BUT peaceful ends is a little bit suspicious... especially since he has given the U.S. very few reasons to trust him.

He then went on to note that Brazil and Argentina have such programs as well.
He doesn't have to explain himself, yet he does anyway. Developing nuclear power simply because other South American countries have it is not a strong reason to get your own nuclear power source. Just because they have it, doesn't mean you need it too, Chavez.

Chavez appears to be getting defensive without anyone actually attacking his reasoning behind this decision yet.

Russia also announced Sunday that they made plans to invest tens of millions of dollars in the Venezuelan oil industry. Of course, this is only days after Russia dispatched a helpful naval fleet of warships to the Venezuelan coast, to, as Chavez put it, "increase our defense capability."

Who does Venezuela need to protect itself from? And why are they enlisting help from Russia? These questions pose deeper issues now that the Venezuela-Russia alliance is strengthening over touchy issues - oil deals, military support, nuclear support. Venezuela has not been on good terms with the U.S. for years, and of course, as of late, neither has Russia. It will be interesting to see where this relationship between the two countries goes and how the U.S. reacts to it.

--Hannah Morris