FORT LEWIS, Wash. - A National Guardsman accused of attempting to pass military intelligence to the al-Qaida terrorist network has been formally charged, an Army spokesman said Wednesday.
Spc. Ryan G. Anderson was charged Feb. 12, but the Army did not immediately release that information, Lt. Col. Stephen Barger said. A military defense lawyer has been appointed for Anderson, but Barger refused to identify the lawyer.
Anderson was charged with two counts of attempting to supply intelligence to the enemy, the Army said.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, defense officials have said Anderson signed on to extremist Internet chat rooms and tried to get in touch with al-Qaida operatives. It is unclear how the U.S. government got wind of his alleged offer to supply military information to the terrorists. It does not appear he transmitted any information to al-Qaida, authorities said.
Barger said the soldier's alleged attempts to pass information occurred between Jan. 22 and Feb. 11.
Anderson, a Muslim convert, was arrested Feb. 12 and is being held at Fort Lewis.
By SCOTT SONNER, Associated Press Writer
RENO, Nev. - The nation's nuclear waste dump proposed for Nevada is poorly designed and could leak highly radioactive waste, a scientist who recently resigned from a federal panel of experts on Yucca Mountain told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Paul Craig, a physicist and engineering professor at the University of California-Davis, said he quit the panel last month so he could speak more freely about the waste dump's dangers.
Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is planned to begin receiving waste in 2010. Some 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste at commercial and military sites in 39 states would be stored in metal canisters underground in tunnels.
"The science is very clear," Craig told AP in an interview before his first public speech about the Energy Department's design for the canisters.
"If we get high-temperature liquids, the metal would corrode and that would eventually lead to leakage of nuclear waste," Craig said.
"Therefore, it is a bad design. And that is very, very bad news for the Department of Energy because they are committed to that design," he said.
Craig, who was appointed to the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board by President Clinton in 1997, planned to speak Wednesday night at a forum sponsored by the Sierra Club. He said he's convinced the Energy Department will have to postpone the project and change to metal less liable to corrode.
"It would require years of delay and my guess is that is what is going to happen. The bad science is so clear they will be unable to ignore it forever," Craig told the AP.
The 11-member technical review board outlined its concerns about the potential for corrosion in a report to the Energy Department in November about the metal for the canisters, called Alloy-22 — "an upscale version of stainless steal," Craig said.
It was the most important report the board has produced since Congress created the panel in 1987, he said, but largely has been ignored by Congress and the department.
"The report says in ordinary English that under the conditions proposed by the Department of Energy, the canisters will leak," Craig said. "It was signed by every single member of the board so there would be no confusion."
Energy Department spokeswoman Gayle Fisher in Las Vegas said the agency had no immediate comment. In Washington D.C., a spokesman for the industry's Nuclear Energy Institute did not immediately return telephone calls seeking comment.
The board's report in November said the government had failed to take into account "deliquescence" — a phenomenon regarding the reaction of salt to moisture — in its plans to operate the dump at temperatures well above boiling water, or about 200 degrees.
At those temperatures, the metal canisters would heat up, causing salts in the surrounding ground to liquefy, thus leading to corrosion, Craig said.
"It turns out the metals which look like they act pretty good at temperature levels below boiling water — those same metals act badly with temperatures that could exist" at Yucca Mountain, he said.
Craig, who also has served as a member of National Academy of Sciences National Research Council Board on Radioactive Waste Management, said he sent his resignation letter to the White House in January before his term was to expire in April so he could shine more light on the government's plans.
"When you serve as a member of one of those boards, you cannot talk about the political consequences of the science or the big picture. You are supposed to stick to the science and you should stick to the science," Craig said.
"You cannot have the kind of conversation we are having now if I was still on the board."
YAHOO - News - Photos: (REUTERS): "Ryan Anderson walks handcuffed past his rifle after being arrested by a Snohomish County Sheriff in this May 22, 1998 file photo when police responded to a call of a man with a firearm near an elementary school near Everett, Washington. U.S. Army Spc. Ryan Anderson, a recent Muslim convert, was charged on February 12, 2004 with trying to pass military secrets to the Islamic militant group al Qaeda after being caught in a sting operation, military officials said on Thursday. (Michael O'leary/The Everett Herald via Reuters)" (February 13, 2004) (Read More/View Photo...)
SEATTLE TIMES.com: "LOCAL SOLDIER ACCUSED OF TRYING TO GIVE AL-QAIDA INFO" by Mike Carter (ARTICLE SNIPPET: " About two years ago, a young man using the screen name "akagunfighter" joined a local Islamic Internet chat room. His real name was Ryan G. Anderson, and he could hardly have been less welcome. Anderson was arrested yesterday by U.S. Army officials, who say the 26-year-old National Guardsman attempted to communicate and provide intelligence to the al-Qaida terrorism network. Anderson, a member of the 81st Armor Brigade about to be deployed to Iraq, has not been formally charged.") (February 13, 2004) (Read More...)