Europe
Europe's sweeping rules for tech giants are about to kick in
Google, Facebook, TikTok and other Big Tech companies operating in Europe are facing one of the most far-reaching efforts to clean up what people encounter online.
The first phase of the European Union’s groundbreaking new digital rules will take effect this week. The Digital Services Act is part of a suite of tech-focused regulations crafted by the 27-nation bloc — long a global leader in cracking down on tech giants.
Read: Putin profits off US and European reliance on Russian nuclear fuel
The DSA, which the biggest platforms must start following Friday, is designed to keep users safe online and stop the spread of harmful content that's either illegal or violates a platform's terms of service, such as promotion of genocide or anorexia. It also looks to protect Europeans' fundamental rights like privacy and free speech.
Some online platforms, which could face billions in fines if they don't comply, have already started making changes.
Here's a look at what's happening this week:
WHICH PLATFORMS ARE AFFECTED?So far, 19. They include eight social media platforms: Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Snapchat.
There are five online marketplaces: Amazon, Booking.com, China's Alibaba AliExpress and Germany's Zalando.
Read: July was the hottest month on record by far, European scientists confirm
Mobile app stores Google Play and Apple's App Store are subject, as are Google's Search and Microsoft's Bing search engine.
Google Maps and Wikipedia round out the list.
WHAT ABOUT OTHER ONLINE COMPANIES?The EU’s list is based on numbers submitted by the platforms. Those with 45 million or more users — or 10% of the EU’s population — will face the DSA’s highest level of regulation.
Brussels insiders, however, have pointed to some notable omissions from the EU's list, like eBay, Airbnb, Netflix and even PornHub. The list isn't definitive, and it's possible other platforms may be added later on.
Any business providing digital services to Europeans will eventually have to comply with the DSA. They will face fewer obligations than the biggest platforms, however, and have another six months before they must fall in line.
Citing uncertainty over the new rules, Meta Platforms has held off launching its Twitter rival, Threads, in the EU.
WHAT'S CHANGING?Platforms have started rolling out new ways for European users to flag illegal online content and dodgy products, which companies will be obligated to take down quickly and objectively.
Read: ‘Made in Bangladesh’ to be showcased in Europe
Amazon opened a new channel for reporting suspected illegal products and is providing more information about third-party merchants.
TikTok gave users an “additional reporting option” for content, including advertising, that they believe is illegal. Categories such as hate speech and harassment, suicide and self-harm, misinformation or frauds and scams, will help them pinpoint the problem.
Then, a “new dedicated team of moderators and legal specialists” will determine whether flagged content either violates its policies or is unlawful and should be taken down, according to the app from Chinese parent company ByteDance.
TikTok says the reason for a takedown will explained to the person who posted the material and the one who flagged it, and decisions can be appealed.
TikTok users can turn off systems that recommend videos based on what a user has previously viewed. Such systems have been blamed for leading social media users to increasingly extreme posts. If personalized recommendations are turned off, TikTok's feeds will instead suggest videos to European users based on what's popular in their area and around the world.
The DSA prohibits targeting vulnerable categories of people, including children, with ads.
Snapchat said advertisers won't be able to use personalization and optimization tools for teens in the EU and U.K. Snapchat users who are 18 and older also would get more transparency and control over ads they see, including "details and insight" on why they're shown specific ads.
TikTok made similar changes, stopping users 13 to 17 from getting personalized ads “based on their activities on or off TikTok.”
IS THERE PUSHBACK?Zalando, a German online fashion retailer, has filed a legal challenge over its inclusion on the DSA's list of the largest online platforms, arguing that it's being treated unfairly.
Nevertheless, Zalando is launching content flagging systems for its website even though there's little risk of illegal material showing up among its highly curated collection of clothes, bags and shoes.
Read: Europe gripped by extreme weather as 'era of global boiling' arrives
The company has supported the DSA, said Aurelie Caulier, Zalando's head of public affairs for the EU.
“It will bring loads of positive changes” for consumers, she said. But “generally, Zalando doesn’t have systemic risk (that other platforms pose). So that’s why we don’t think we fit in that category."
Amazon has filed a similar case with a top EU court.
WHAT HAPPENS IF COMPANIES DON'T FOLLOW THE RULES?Officials have warned tech companies that violations could bring fines worth up to 6% of their global revenue — which could amount to billions — or even a ban from the EU. But don't expect penalties to come right away for individual breaches, such as failing to take down a specific video promoting hate speech.
Instead, the DSA is more about whether tech companies have the right processes in place to reduce the harm that their algorithm-based recommendation systems can inflict on users. Essentially, they'll have to let the European Commission, the EU's executive arm and top digital enforcer, look under the hood to see how their algorithms work.
Read: A cause whose time has come: Conference calls for European Parliament’s recognition of 1971 Bangladesh Genocide
EU officials “are concerned with user behavior on the one hand, like bullying and spreading illegal content, but they’re also concerned about the way that platforms work and how they contribute to the negative effects,” said Sally Broughton Micova, an associate professor at the University of East Anglia.
That includes looking at how the platforms work with digital advertising systems, which could be used to profile users for harmful material like disinformation, or how their livestreaming systems function, which could be used to instantly spread terrorist content, said Broughton Micova, who's also academic co-director at the Centre on Regulation in Europe, a Brussels-based think tank.
Under the rules, the biggest platforms will have to identify and assess potential systemic risks and whether they're doing enough to reduce them. These risk assessments are due by the end of August and then they will be independently audited.
The audits are expected to be the main tool to verify compliance — though the EU's plan has faced criticism for lacking details that leave it unclear how the process will work.
WHAT ABOUT THE REST OF THE WORLD?Europe's changes could have global impact. Wikipedia is tweaking some policies and modifying its terms of service to provide more information on “problematic users and content.” Those alterations won’t be limited to Europe, said the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation, which hosts the community-powered encyclopedia.
“The rules and processes that govern Wikimedia projects worldwide, including any changes in response to the DSA, are as universal as possible. This means that changes to our Terms of Use and Office Actions Policy will be implemented globally,” it said in a statement.
It's going to be hard for tech companies to limit DSA-related changes, said Broughton Micova, adding that digital ad networks aren’t isolated to Europe and that social media influencers can have global reach.
The regulations are “dealing with multichannel networks that operate globally. So there is going to be a ripple effect once you have kind of mitigations that get taken into place," she said.
Nearly 2,000 unaccompanied immigrant minors landed in Rome over the weekend
Nearly 2,000 unaccompanied migrant minors landed in Italy at the weekend, the interior ministry said Monday.
Some 1,902 migrant children without any parent came to Italy's southern shores, it said.
Read: All Alpine glaciers above zero, says CNR
Some 12,188 of them have arrived since the start of the year, the ministry said, adding that overall migrant arrivals have been 105,449, over double the 50,759 of the same period last year.
Read: Migrant sea arrivals more than double so far in 2023
In August alone, it said, some 16,512 migrants have landed in Italy. (ANSA).
British nurse imprisoned for life for the murders of 7 babies and attempted murders of 6
A former neonatal nurse convicted of murdering seven babies in her care and trying to kill six others at a hospital in northern England was sentenced Monday to life in prison with no chance of release by a judge who highlighted "the cruelty and calculation" of her actions.
Lucy Letby, who refused to appear in court to face her sentencing or to hear grieving parents share their anger and anguish, was given the most severe punishment possible under British law, which does not allow the death penalty.
Justice James Goss said the number of killings and attempts and the nature of the murders by a nurse entrusted with caring for the most fragile infants provided the "exceptional circumstances" required to impose a rare "whole-life order."
"There was a malevolence bordering on sadism in your action," Goss said, addressing the absent defendant. "During the course of this trial, you have coldly denied any responsibility for your wrongdoing. You have no remorse. There are no mitigating factors."
A Manchester Crown Court jury that deliberated 22 days convicted Letby, 33, of murdering the seven babies over a yearlong period that saw her prey on the vulnerabilities of sick newborns and their anxious parents.
The victims, who were given anonymity and listed only by letters, such as Child A and Child B, died in the neonatal unit at the Countess of Chester Hospital in northwest England between June 2015 and June 2016.
"I don't think we will ever get over the fact that our daughter was tortured till she had no fight left in her and everything she went through over her short life was deliberately done by someone who was supposed to protect her and help her come home where she belonged," the mother of a girl identified as Child I said in a statement read in court.
Prosecutor Nicholas Johnson said Letby deserved a "whole-life tariff" for "sadistic conduct" and premeditated crimes.
Defense lawyer Ben Myers said Letby maintained her innocence and that there was nothing he could add that would be able to reduce her sentence.
Some families suffered multiple tragedies, as Letby targeted three sets of twins and a set of triplets.
A mother of twins was left to grieve the loss of a son and blame herself when her family — vigilant to watch over the second infant after the first one's death — let their guard down and Letby struck again, harming the boy's sister, who survived.
"Little did we know you were waiting for us to leave so you could attack the one thing that gave us a reason to carry on in life," the mother said.
The parents of triplets lost two of their babies, and the third survived after being transferred to another hospital. The couple said in a video played in court that Letby had ruined their lives.
"The anger and the hatred I have towards her will never go away," the father said. "It has destroyed me as a man and as a father."
One father called Letby "the devil" and said she had tried to kill his daughter twice. The nurse didn't succeed but the girl was left blind, with brain damage and having to be fed through a tube.
"Every day I would sit there and pray. I would pray for God to save her," the father of Child G said. "He did. He saved her, but the devil found her."
Letby's absence, which is allowed in British courts during sentencing, fueled anger from the families of the victims, who wanted her to listen to statements about the devastation caused by her crimes.
Politicians and victim advocates have called for changes in the law to force criminals to appear for sentencing after several high-profile convicts chose not to face their victims in recent months.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who called the crimes "shocking and harrowing," said his government would bring forward in "due course" its plan to require convicts to attend their sentencings.
"It's cowardly that people who commit such horrendous crimes do not face their victims and hear first-hand the impact that their crimes have had on them and their families and loved ones," Sunak said.
An independent inquiry will be conducted into what happened at the hospital and how staff and management responded to the spike in deaths. However, there are calls for a more formal inquiry led by a judge who could order people to testify.
During Letby's 10-month trial, prosecutors said that in 2015 the hospital started to see a significant rise in the number of babies who were dying or suffering sudden declines in their health for no apparent reason.
Some suffered "serious catastrophic collapses" but survived after getting help from medical personnel.
Letby was on duty in all of the cases, with prosecutors describing her as a "constant malevolent presence" in the neonatal unit when the children experienced medical distress or died. The nurse harmed babies in ways that were difficult to detect, and she persuaded colleagues that their collapses and deaths were normal, they said.
Senior doctors said over the weekend that they had raised concerns about Letby as early as October 2015 and that children might have been saved if managers had taken their concerns seriously.
Dr. Stephen Brearey, the head consultant at the Countess of Chester Hospital's neonatal unit, told the Guardian newspaper that deaths could arguably have been avoided as early as February 2016 if executives had "responded appropriately" to an urgent meeting request from concerned doctors.
Letby was finally removed from front-line duties in late June 2016. She was arrested at her home in July 2018.
After Letby was arrested, police found a note in her home that served as a chilling confession: "I killed them on purpose because I'm not good enough to care for them," she wrote. "I am a horrible evil person."
The mother of Child C wept on the witness stand as she spoke of the loss of her firstborn, a "feisty" and "defenseless baby boy."
She had worn her son's hand and foot prints around her neck to remember him. The later realization that the person who took those prints — Letby — was the same person who took his life tainted the memory, she said.
"There is no sentence that will ever compare to the excruciating agony that we have suffered as a consequence of your actions," she said. "At least now there is no debate that, in your own words, you killed them on purpose. You are evil. You did this."
All Alpine glaciers above zero, says CNR
Italy's National Research Council (CNR) said Sunday that all of Italy's Alpine glaciers were current above zero degrees amid an ongoing string of heatwaves and as a result of the climate crisis.
Read: Putin profits off US and European reliance on Russian nuclear fuel "All the Alpine glaciers, at all altitudes, are above zero and the situation is quite critical", said Claudio Tei, researcher and meteorologist at the CNR and the Lamma Consortium, on the heat wave that is sweeping Central and Northern Italy, due to a sub-tropical anticyclone coming from Africa.
Read: A bus crashes off the road in central Turkey, leaving 12 passengers dead
"The hottest days predicted by the models are Monday 21 and Tuesday 22 August, with peaks of 38 degrees in some cities and more than 7 degrees above this season's average, even 10 degrees above seasonal values in the western Alps," Tei explains, "while the zero temperature at altitude is expected to rise up to 5,000 metres..
A bus crashes off the road in central Turkey, leaving 12 passengers dead
A passenger bus veered off the road and crashed into a roadside ditch in central Turkey on Monday, killing 12 people and injuring 19 others, officials said.
The driver of the bus lost control of the vehicle, which crossed into the oncoming lane and then plunged into the ditch near the central Turkish city of Yozgat, Gov. Mehmet Ali Ozkan said.
The bus was traveling from Sivas — some 240 kilometers (150 miles) east of Yozgat — to Istanbul.
Read: 131 dead in 137 railway accidents in 6 months of 2023: SCRF
Ozkan said 11 of the passengers died at the scene of the crash while one died later in the hospital.
The injured passengers were being treated in nearby hospitals and one of them was in serious condition, he said.
The cause of the crash was under investigation, Ozkan said, adding that it appeared to be the result of “carelessness” by the driver.
Read more: 16 workers killed in the collapse of a crane being used to build a bridge in India
China appears to be building an airstrip on a disputed South China Sea island
China appears to be constructing an airstrip on a disputed South China Sea island that is also claimed by Vietnam and Taiwan, according to satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press.
The work on Triton island in the Paracel group mirrors construction on seven human-made islands in the Spratly group to the east which have been equipped with airstrips, docks and military systems, although it currently appears to be somewhat more modest in scale.
China claims virtually the entire South China Sea as its own, denying the claims of others and defying an international ruling invalidating its assertion.
Also read: India and China pledge to maintain 'peace and tranquility' along disputed border despite tensions
Satellite photos from Planet Labs PBC analyzed by the AP show construction on the airstrip first visible in early August. News website The Drive first reported on the satellite images Tuesday.
The runway, as currently laid out, would be more than 600 meters (2,000 feet) in length, long enough to accommodate turboprop aircraft and drones, but not fighter jets or bombers.
Also visible are large numbers of vehicle tracks running across much of the island, along with what appear to be containers and construction equipment.
Triton is one of the major islands in the Paracels, which is roughly equidistant from the coast of Vietnam and China's island province of Hainan.
The U.S. takes no stance on the sovereignty claims, but regularly sends Navy ships on "freedom of navigation operations" near the Chinese-held islands. Triton was the focus of one of those missions in 2018.
Also read: China says US military aid to Taiwan will not deter its will to unify the island
China has had a small harbor and buildings on the island for years, along with a helipad and radar arrays. Two large fields on the island sport a star from the Chinese flag and a hammer and sickle representing the ruling Communist Party.
China has refused to provide details of its island construction work other than to say it is aimed at helping global navigation safety. It has rejected accusations that it is militarizing the crucial waterway, through which an estimated $5 trillion in trade passes annually, and says it has the right to do as it wishes in its sovereign territory.
China seized full control of the Paracels from Vietnam in a brief 1974 naval conflict.
Also read: US -China conflict: A civilizational or a cold war ?
Migrant sea arrivals more than double so far in 2023
Migrant sea arrivals more than doubled in the first seven months of 2023 compared to the same period last year, according to interior ministry data released on Tuesday.
Italy registered 89,158 landings on its southern shores from January to July, compared to 41,435 in 2022, a rise of 115.18%.
Read: Russia evacuates 2,000 in Far East flooding
In the first seven months of the year the main country of departure to Italy was Tunisia.
In the same period in 2022 the main country of departure was Libya.
2023 has also seen an increase in the number of arrivals following search and rescue events, according to the ministry.
Read: Ukraine accuses Russia of targeting rescue workers with consecutive missile strikes
In the period January-July 64,764 migrants and refugees - 72.64% of total sea arrivals - were disembarked in Italy following a sea rescue, compared to 19,171 - 43.27% of the total - in the same period in 2022.
Of the people disembarked following sea rescue, 5.8% were rescued by humanitarian ships run by NGOs.
The number of applications for asylum also increased by 70.59% to 72,460, the ministry said.
Read: Europe gripped by extreme weather as 'era of global boiling' arrives
Some 2,561 people were repatriated following a negative outcome to their asylum claim, up 28.05% over the same period last year.
Russia hits Ukrainian grain depots again as a foreign ship tries out Kyiv's new Black Sea corridor
KYIV, Ukraine,Aug 16(AP/UNB) Russia resumed its targeting of grain infrastructure in Ukraine's southern Odesa region, local officials said Wednesday, using drones in overnight strikes on storage facilities and ports along the Danube River that Kyiv has increasingly used for grain transport to Europe after Moscow broke off a key wartime export deal through the Black Sea.
Read also:Ukraine accuses Russia of targeting rescue workers with consecutive missile strikes
At the same time, a loaded container ship stuck at the port of Odesa since Russia's full-scale invasion more than 17 months ago set sail and was heading through the Black Sea to the Bosporus along a temporary corridor established by Ukraine for merchant shipping.
Read also:Russia promises retaliation after Ukrainian drones hit a Russian tanker in 2nd sea attack in a day
Ukraine's economy, crunched by the war, is heavily dependent on farming. Its agricultural exports, like those of Russia, are also crucial for world supplies of wheat, barley, sunflower oil and other food that developing nations rely on.
Read also:US to send $200 million in military aid to Ukraine
After the Kremlin tore up a month ago an agreement brokered last summer by the U.N. and Turkey to ensure safe Ukraine grain exports through the Black Sea, Kyiv has sought to reroute transport through the Danube and road and rail links into Europe. But transport costs that way are much higher, some European countries have balked at the consequences for local grain prices, and the Danube ports can't handle the same volume as seaports.
Odesa Gov. Oleh Kiper said the primary targets of Russia's overnight drone bombardment were port terminals and grain silos, including at the ports in the Danube delta. Air defenses managed to intercept 13 drones, according to Kiper.
It was the latest attack amid weeks of aerial strikes as Russia has targeted the Danube delta ports, which are only about 15 kilometers (10 miles) from the Romanian border. The Danube is Europe's second-longest river and a key transport route.
Meanwhile, the container ship departing Odesa was the first vessel to set sail since July 16, according to Oleksandr Kubrakov, Ukraine's deputy prime minister. It had been stuck in Odesa since February 2022.
The Hong Kong-flagged Joseph Schulte was traveling down a temporary corridor that Ukraine asked the International Maritime Organization to ratify. The United States has warned that the Russian military is preparing for possible attacks on civilian shipping vessels in the Black Sea.
Sea mines also make the voyage risky, and ship insurance costs are likely to be high for operators. Ukraine told the IMO it would would "provide guarantees of compensation for damage."
Last Sunday, a Russian warship fired warning shots at a Palau-flagged cargo ship in the south Black Sea. According to Russia's Defense Ministry, the Sukru Okan was heading northwards to the Ukrainian Danube River port of Izmail.
Ship-tracking data analyzed by The Associated Press confirmed that the Joseph Schulte was steaming south.
The Joseph Schulte is carrying more than 30,000 tons of cargo, with 2,114 containers, including food products, according to Kubrakov.
He said the corridor will be primarily used to evacuate ships stuck in the Ukrainian ports of Chornomorsk, Odesa and Pivdennyi since the outbreak of war.
On the war's front line, Ukrainian officials claimed another milestone in Kyiv's grinding counteroffensive, with Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar saying troops have retaken a village in the eastern Donetsk region.
The village of Urozhaine is near Staromaiorske, a hamlet that Ukraine also claimed to have recaptured recently. The claims could not be independently verified.
Ukraine appears to be trying to drive a wedge between Russian forces in the south, but it is up against strong defensive lines and is advancing without air support.
Also Wednesday, the Russian military said it shot down three drones over the Kaluga region southwest of Moscow and blamed the attack on Ukraine. No damage or casualties were reported.
Russia evacuates 2,000 in Far East flooding
Over 2,000 people have been evacuated from flooded areas of the Primorye region in Russia’s Far East, emergency officials said Sunday.
The heavy downpours that flooded villages in the region were slated to bring double the monthly rainfall to some areas over the weekend, according to Russian state media.
Read: Deadly flooding is hitting several countries at once. Scientists say this will only be more common
“More than 2,000 people, including 405 children, have been evacuated in Primorye,” the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry said on Telegram.
Over 4,300 residential buildings were flooded and 28 settlements cut off by floodwaters, with 16 of the region’s districts affected.
Read: Beijing records heaviest rainfall in at least 140 years, causing severe flooding and 21 deaths
On Friday, local officials said that downpours had already caused floods in seven districts and killed at least three people — a woman and two children, ages 10 and 12.
The rain was from the remnants of Typhoon Khanun, which earlier battered Japan and the Korean Peninsula.
Read more: 11 dead and 27 missing in flooding around Beijing after days of rain
Putin profits off US and European reliance on Russian nuclear fuel
The U.S. and its European allies are importing vast amounts of nuclear fuel and compounds from Russia, providing Moscow with hundreds of millions of dollars in badly needed revenue as it wages war on Ukraine.
The sales, which are legal and unsanctioned, have raised alarms from nonproliferation experts and elected officials who say the imports are helping to bankroll the development of Moscow’s nuclear arsenal and are complicating efforts to curtail Russia’s war-making abilities. The dependence on Russian nuclear products — used mostly to fuel civilian reactors — leaves the U.S. and its allies open to energy shortages if Russian President Vladimir Putin were to cut off supplies. The challenge is likely to grow more intense as those nations seek to boost production of emissions-free electricity to combat climate change.
“We have to give money to the people who make weapons? That’s absurd,” said Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Washington-based Nonproliferation Policy Education Center. “If there isn’t a clear rule that prevents nuclear power providers from importing fuel from Russia — and it’s cheaper to get it from there — why wouldn’t they do it?”
Russia sold about $1.7 billion in nuclear products to firms in the U.S. and Europe, according to trade data and experts. The purchases occurred as the West has leveled stiff sanctions on Moscow over its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, blocking imports of such Russian staples as oil, gas, vodka and caviar.
Russia’s military push on the eastern front prompts Ukraine to evacuate thousands of civiliansThe West has been reluctant to target Russia’s nuclear exports, however, because they play key roles in keeping reactors humming. Russia supplied the U.S. nuclear industry with about 12% of its uranium last year, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Europe reported getting about 17% of its uranium in 2022 from Russia.
Reliance on nuclear power is expected to grow as nations embrace alternatives to fossil fuels. Nuclear power plants produce no emissions, though experts warn that nuclear energy comes with the risk of reactor meltdowns and the challenge of how to safely store radioactive waste. There are about 60 reactors under construction around the world — 300 more are in the planning stages.
Many of the 30 countries generating nuclear energy in some 440 plants are importing radioactive materials from Russia’s state-owned energy corporation Rosatom and its subsidiaries. Rosatom leads the world in uranium enrichment, and is ranked third in uranium production and fuel fabrication, according to its 2022 annual report.
Rosatom, which says it is building 33 new reactors in 10 counties, and its subsidiaries, exported around $2.2 billion worth of nuclear energy-related goods and materials last year, according to trade data analyzed by the Royal United Service Institute, a London-based think-tank. The institute said that figure is likely much larger because it is difficult to track such exports.
Rosatom’s CEO Alexei Likhachyov told the Russian newspaper Izvestia the company’s foreign business should total $200 billion over the next decade. That lucrative civilian business provides critical funds for Rosatom’s other major responsibility: designing and producing Russia’s atomic arsenal, experts say.
Ukrainian officials have pleaded with world leaders to sanction Rosatom to cut off one of Moscow’s last significant funding streams and to punish Putin for launching the invasion. Ukrainian President Volodmyr Zelenskyy again pressed Western leaders to target Rosatom after Russian forces captured the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Rosatom is running the partially shutdown plant, and the International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly warned that a radiation leak at the Russian-occupied facility could be a major disaster.
“Ukraine does not understand why sanctions have not yet been introduced against Rosatom and its leadership,” Zelenskyy said in May, “when representatives of this company continue to occupy Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant and put our general security at risk.”
Nuclear energy advocates say the U.S. and some European countries would face difficulty in cutting off imports of Russian nuclear products. The U.S. nuclear energy industry, which largely outsources its fuel, produces about 20% of U.S. electricity.
The value of Russian nuclear fuel and products sent to the U.S. hit $871 million last year, up from $689 million in 2021 and $610 million in 2020, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In terms of weight, U.S. imports of uranium products from Russia nearly doubled from 6.3 tons in 2020 to 12.5 tons in 2022, according to trade data from ImportGenius.
The reasons for that reliance goes back decades. The U.S. uranium industry took a beating following a 1993 nonproliferation deal that resulted in the importation of inexpensive weapons-grade uranium from Russia, experts say. The downturn accelerated after a worldwide drop in demand for nuclear fuel following the 2011 meltdown of three reactors at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi power plant.
American nuclear plants plants purchased 5% of their uranium from domestic suppliers in 2021, the last year for which official U.S. production data are available, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The largest source of uranium for such plants was Kazakhstan, which contributed about 35% of the supply. A close Russian ally, Kazakhstan is the world’s largest producer of uranium.
The Biden administration says it is trying to revive uranium mining and the production of nuclear fuel, and lawmakers have introduced legislation to speed up the process. This week, however, President Joe Biden announced the formation of a national monument to preserve land around Grand Canyon National Park that would prevent new uranium mining in the region.
“It is critical that we stop funding Russia’s state-owned nuclear monopoly, Rosatom,” said Sen. John Barrasso, the Wyoming Republican who introduced legislation earlier this year to fund America’s nuclear fuel supply chain. “We also need to give America’s nuclear fuel suppliers market certainty.”
Europe is in a bind largely because it has 19 Russian-designed reactors in five countries that are fully dependent on Russian nuclear fuel. France also has a long history of relying on Russian-enriched uranium. In a report published in March, Greenpeace, citing the United Nations’ Comtrade database, showed that French imports of enriched uranium from Russia increased from 110 tons in 2021 to 312 tons in 2022.
Europe spent nearly $828 million (almost €750 million) last year on Russian nuclear industry products — including fuel elements, nuclear reactors, and machinery — according to Eurostat, the EU’s statistics office.
Some European nations are taking steps to wean themselves off Russian uranium. Early on in the Ukraine conflict, Sweden refused to purchase Russian nuclear fuel. Finland, which relies on Russian power at two out of its five reactors, scrapped a trouble-ridden deal with Rosatom to build a new nuclear power plant. Finnish energy company Fortum also announced an agreement with the U.S. Westinghouse Electric Company to supply fuel for two reactors after its contracts with Rosatom subsidiary Tvel expire over the next seven years.
The Czech Republic has sought to wean itself off Russian supplies completely and turned to Westinghouse and the French company Framatome for future shipments of fuel assemblies for its only nuclear power plant, currently supplied by Tvel, with the new supplies expected to begin in 2024. Slovakia and Bulgaria, two other countries that rely on Tvel for nuclear fuel, have also turned to different suppliers.
Despite the challenges, experts believe political pressure and questions over Russia’s ability to cut off supplies will eventually spur much of Europe to abandon Rosatom. “Based on apparent prospects (of diversification of fuel supplies), it would be fair to say that Rosatom has lost the European market,” said Vladimir Slivyak, co-chair of the Russian environmental group Ecodefense.
What remains unclear, Slivyak said, are how Hungary and France will address the issue. France has not expressed a willingness to shut off Russia’s uranium spigot. Hungary, which maintains close ties to Russia, is fully dependent on Moscow to provide fuel for its four-reactor nuclear power plant. It has plans to expand that plant by two Rosatom reactors — a project that is financed by a 10 billion euro line of credit from a Russian bank.
Those reactors, experts said, will be fully reliant on Russian nuclear fuel for years, if not decades, to come.