A US mining company is threatening the sacred lands of Aboriginal peoples in Australia. In the outback of the Southern Australian Adelaide and Flinders Ranges, the United States weapons and energy producing giant: Quasar Resources is venturing with Alliance Resources to mine over 3.9 million tons of U308, also known as yellowcake or depleted uranium from the newly discovered Four Mile Mine. Quasar is controlled by billionaire James Neil Blue, who holds over a billion dollars in Pentagon contracts for energy and weapons manufacturing. Blue was instrumental in designing the unmanned Predator aircraft currently being used in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The local communities, traditional owners, and Adnyamathanha Aboriginals are outraged with the Australian government, stating that their voices haven’t been heard during the negotiations for the Four Mile uranium mine, and that Quasar Resources and the Government are simply ignoring their cultural and health concerns. The other uranium enriched Beverly Mine, located next to the Four Mile Mine has already had a recorded 59 spills of radioactive material since the past decade, according to the South Australian Department of Primary Industries and Resources. Mining U308 is highly dangerous and can cause dermatitis, renal damage and acute necrotic arterial lesions and death.
Title: Secretive US Arms Tycoon behind New Uranium Mine in Australia
Source: The Sydney Morning Herald 7/16/2009
URL: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/secretive-arms-tycoon-behind-new-uranium-mine-20090715-dllw.html
Author: Ben Cubby
Student Researcher: Eric Herbert
Faculty Evaluator: Irv Peterson, ENSP
Sonoma State University: Sociology of Media, Fall 2009
Instructor: Peter Phillips, #04
[...] The Media Freedom Foundation » Secretive US Arms Tycoon behind New Uranium Mine in Australia [...]
I have the spelling of him middle name NEAL. As in James Neal Blue. I found a write up in Forbes: http://people.forbes.com/profile/james-neal-blue/59511
He made only $60,000 in 2008. Yeah…. I’d like to see that topic discussed a bit further!
One should look deeply through the workings of Neal Blue, from Mom’s tenure as State Treasurer in Colorado to banana plantations in Nicaragua back in the late ’50′s through his numerous national/international corporations (General Atomics – i.e. Predator and so much more); audience with the Pope…. connections with the Pan Am explosion over Lockerbie.. and not forgetting his brother Linden’s several short lived air transport corporations during the Air America hey-day. It’s a very long and pathetic story of corporate control over civil society covering a good lot of the world.
Ahhh, the most personal closely held….. land near Telluride, CO.
Quasar Resources? Sadly, Neal Blue wouldn’t know yellowcake uranium if it was laying on the sidewalk. It’s simply a means to an end and that end does not include the Aboriginals of Australia.
Look deep across this man’s web and know the fear of knowledge.
A few points on this story.
1. Yellowcake is not mined. Yellowcake is the concentrate that is produced from the mined uranium ore.
2. Nobody mines depleted uranium either. Depleted uranium is uranium with the useful U-235 isotope taken out. If there was no U-235 in the ore, there would be no reason to mine it.
3. The mining of U3O8 is not ‘highly dangerous”. It is done safely in many countries including Australia, Canada, the USA, South Africa, Namibia and many others. In fact, since uranium mining is more highly regulated that mining other minerals, uranium mines have very high standards of occupational health and safety. Coal mining, for example, is by far more dangerous.
In the future, I suggest you get the technical aspects of a story correct or you will continue to embarrass yourselves.
Sincerely,
Eric L. Hanson