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Algeria has minimized the value of French bill related to the compensation of victims of nuclear tests in the Algerian Sahara, and Polynesia. In fact, APS has quoted Foreign Minister, Mourad Medelci, saying the abovementioned financial compensations "are not the lone required demand capable of settling such issue, but rather removing the nuclear pollution caused by such tests." At the margin of Africa Day celebrations, attended by accredited diplomatic corps, Medelci indicated that Algeria is following with great interest the French bill on nuclear damages compensation. He further mentioned that "such a bill would only settle a part of the issue."

Algerian nuclear installations are to be reinforced with French made reactors, following a nuclear agreement, of which content has been set later last month, Geopolitic.com said. The agreement is expected to be sealed on the occasion of the visit the French Prime Minister is to pay to Algiers by 21 June, noting that a year earlier, Algeria has expressed her will to construct a third nuclear reactor.

The French National Assembly approved a landmark bill on compensating the victims of nuclear tests carried out in French Polynesia and Algeria over more than three decades. Some 150,000 civilian and military personnel took part in 210 nuclear tests carried out in the Sahara desert and the Pacific between 1960 and 1996. Many of them later developed serious health problems.

France's parliament has passed a law to compensate victims of nuclear tests in Algeria and the South Pacific, a response to decades of complaints by people sickened by radiation. The law cleared France's Senate on Tuesday, its final legislative hurdle following approval in the National Assembly in June. France "can at last close a chapter of its history", Defence Minister Herve Morin said in a statement. He called the law "just, rigorous and balanced." The text, hammered out with help from victims' associations, recognises the right for victims of France's more than 200 nuclear tests to receive compensation. Some 150,000 people, including civilian and military personnel, were on site for the 210 tests France carried out, both in the atmosphere and underground, in the Sahara Desert and the South Pacific from 1960-1996.

France's parliament has passed a law to compensate victims of nuclear tests in Algeria and the South Pacific, a response to decades of complaints by people sickened by radiation. The law cleared France's Senate on Tuesday, its final legislative hurdle following approval in the National Assembly in June. France "can at last close a chapter of its history", Defence Minister Herve Morin said in a statement. He called the law "just, rigorous and balanced." The text, hammered out with help from victims' associations, recognises the right for victims of France's more than 200 nuclear tests to receive compensation. Some 150,000 people, including civilian and military personnel, were on site for the 210 tests France carried out, both in the atmosphere and underground, in the Sahara Desert and the South Pacific from 1960-1996.

The French Polynesian Nuclear Test Veterans Association says it'll fight for a better package for the victims of the French nuclear test fallout. The French Senate has passed a bill to compensate nuclear test veterans for the consequences of its weapons tests between 1960 and 1996 in French Polynesia and Algeria. France had earlier said its test were safe and clean. Moruroa e Tatou's head, Roland Oldham, says the Loi Morin is unjust.

The French Polynesian Nuclear Test Veterans Association says it'll fight for a better package for the victims of the French nuclear test fallout. The French Senate has passed a bill to compensate nuclear test veterans for the consequences of its weapons tests between 1960 and 1996 in French Polynesia and Algeria. France had earlier said its test were safe and clean. Moruroa e Tatou's head, Roland Oldham, says the Loi Morin is unjust.

Henri Bour glances round the courtyard of the old farmhouse his parents restored when they fled Algeria after independence in 1962. "There was nothing here, not even a single vine. They did everything. That's why I don't want to let it go," he says. For 10 years he has run the Grangeneuve vineyard in Coteaux de Tricastin, the arid, southern region of the Rhône Valley. Now, aged 65 and thinking about handing over to the next generation, the former Pernod Ricard executive fears for the future.

Russian strategic bombers may soon be deployed at airbases in Cuba, Venezuela and Algeria as a response to the U.S. missile shield in Europe and NATO's expansion, Russian daily Izvestia said on Thursday. Moscow has strongly opposed the possible deployment by the U.S. of 10 interceptor missiles in Poland and an accompanying tracking radar in the Czech Republic as a threat to its national security. Washington says the defenses are needed to deter a possible strike from Iran, or other "rogue" states.

June 3 (Bloomberg) -- On May 1, 1962, Lucien Parfait watched the In-Eker Mountain in the southern desert of Algeria tremble and fissure under a black cloud full of dust. Parfait, 68, witnessed one of France's 210 atomic tests from a distance of 800 meters (2,625 feet) with only a white cotton overall for protection. The former French army draftee, who'd dug tunnels in the mountain to place the bomb, is among thousands of people who say they were exposed to radiation from atomic tests between 1960 and 1996 in France's former Algerian colony and in the Polynesian atolls of Mururoa and Fangataufa.

June 3 (Bloomberg) -- On May 1, 1962, Lucien Parfait watched the In-Eker Mountain in the southern desert of Algeria tremble and fissure under a black cloud full of dust. Parfait, 68, witnessed one of France's 210 atomic tests from a distance of 800 meters (2,625 feet) with only a white cotton overall for protection.

Top Russian officials on Wednesday acknowledged for the first time that a ship hijacked in the Baltic Sea might have been carrying a suspicious cargo, deepening the mystery around its seizure. Speculation has been raging that the Arctic Sea -- seized by pirates last month and missing for weeks before its recapture by the Russian navy in the Atlantic -- may have held weapons or even nuclear materials. The Maltese-flagged vessel with a crew of 15 Russian sailors was officially heading to Algeria with a cargo of timber. But Moscow's top investigator, Alexander Bastrykin, cast doubt on that theory. "We do not rule out the possibility that the Arctic Sea transported something other than wood," Bastrykin told the official government newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

The French National Assembly has approved a bill to compensate the victims of the nuclear tests it carried out in French Polynesia and Algeria for more than three decades. It's the first time the French government has acknowledged it has a legal obligation to compensate the 150,000 military personnel and local staff who may have suffered serious health problems due to exposure to radiation. But the workers aren't happy, saying the new bill falls short of what they need.

Paris - An appeals court in Paris Friday rejected a demand for compensation by 12 former soldiers who said they had contracted fatal cancers when they took part in French atomic weapons testing between 1960 and 1996, French media reported. The court ruled the cases of 11 of the soldiers were invalid because their alleged radiation contamination took place before January 1, 1976, the threshold year fixed by law. Regarding the case of the twelfth soldier, which dated from 1983, the judge ruled that the appeals court was not the correct venue. The case should have been heard by court competent to rule on workplace accidents, the judge said. Only five of the 12 soldiers were on hand to hear the verdict. The other seven had died of their ailments, which included cancer of the skin, thyroid and kidney and leukemia. An estimated 150,000 civilians and ex-soldiers who took part in the 210 above-ground nuclear weapons tests France carried out in Algeria and Polynesia were potentially affected by Friday's ruling. Defence Minister Herve Morin admitted in March that several hundred people may have developed cancers as a result of radiation from the tests. He proposed a compensation plan offering 10 million euros to the victims in 2009.

A ten-million euro compensation package for the victims of nuclear test is being described as "peanuts". The French Defence minister Hervé Morin has outlined the main points of a proposed Bill to compensate, for the first time, victims of nuclear testing conducted by France both in Algeria and later in French Polynesia, between 1966 and 1996. Roland Oldham, the president of the French Polynesian nuclear test veterans' group, Mururoa o Tatou, says the deal is a bad joke. "They announce a few million like that, just like we should be very happy, we should drop on our knees and say thank you to the French Government. But that's not the case at all, because it's peanuts , it really is peanuts when you compare how the French government spends a lot of money on defence."

The head of a group representing the victims of nuclear testing in French Polynesia says a law to provide them compensation is a public relations exercise. France's Minister of Defence recently outlined the main points of a proposed Bill to compensate, for the first time, victims of nuclear testing it conducted both in Algeria and later in French Polynesia, between 1966 and 1996. The compensation announcement precedes a court hearing in which the French government will answer to charges it failed to protect its French Polynesian workers from nuclear fallout during that time.

"A French senator representing French Polynesia has labelled the French law to compensate victims of the nuclear weapons tests as an alibi for the government to give it a good conscience. Richard Tuheiava made the comment in Algeria where a meeting is being held to discuss the aftermath of the French weapons tests which began in the Algerian desert before being continued in the South Pacific."

"Oil and gas remain critical sources of power and energy for North African nations. In the medium term, hydrocarbons will remain the predominant sources of energy, whether it is for the OPEC countries of Algeria and Libya or the less-oil-endowed nations of Tunisia and Morocco. But in the longer term, the nuclear option appears interesting to all as oil reserves are depleted and securing new sources of energy is a strategic priority. On the ground, all North African nations have been working somewhat to develop nuclear capabilities for civilian and industrial use. Each country has put in place programs that have been supported or endorsed by a Western super power, notably France, which has obvious economic interest in helping develop such industry. The North Africa Journal Take: * Despite media noise in the region that relay political views instead of depicting the reality, no single North African nation is contemplating the use of the nuclear option for non-civilian purposes. Various media sources and analysts outside of the region have also been raising red flags but we believe their positions are unfounded and without any base, essentially motivated by political reasons"