During the 90s and i faced that in 2002, 2003, and we know the importance of the independence of verification. You had it in bilateral agreements, verification with russia and thats long tradition. Thats one thing. But multilateral inspections are needed in cases like iran and like iraq. And in that for that you need impartial independent Civil Servants that are not subject to any corruption, that will not go to do the work with any of the intelligence agencies that are crawling all over the place. So i would like to ask you your view about the importance of independent verification as a third of the many issues you have on your agenda. Thank you very much. [ applause ] thank you very much, dr. Blix. Listening to you, i now realize why you received the award. And thank you for not retire, multiple times. Your honor please. [ applause ] you define what a Public Servant is. So thank you for your service. And thank you for your continuing to push the government and think about the issues in a holistic way. So thank you. You did a nice job of introducing the panel. That was my job but youve done that well, much better than i, i assure you. But i am honored to be here with madame undersecretary. I should say that rose and her colleagues at the state department so im biased a little bit. If im too nice to her, youll be able to define that to me later. But again, we Work Together but i think as dr. Blix mentioned, not only has she been at the forefront of these issues, i should say i worked with her on the new s. T. A. R. T. Treaty. And if i think about one of our biggest success of the Obama Administration and working with secretary clinton at the time, that was it. Over great odds. Im just thrilled by the work you did and the energy and working the hill and trying to get us to move forward. So, thank you very much for your service. And as you know, she was a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment before coming to International Peace and served as director of the carnegie moscow center. Madam chairman, thank you very much for coming as well. As you know, Allison Macfarlane has led the nrc since 2012, is an expert on regulatory issues around safety of our nations 100 Nuclear Reactors. Shes a docker to rat in geology from m. I. T. Focuses on Nuclear Waste issues throughout her professional and academic career. Prior to taking on this position, she was she was the chairman and served as president obamas Blue Ribbon Commission of American Nuclear future from 2010 to 2012. What is clear to me is i have the lowest iq of anyone on this panel. So, its a little its a little intimidating. But since i get to ask the questions, well see how that all works. Rose, help me think about russia. Obviously all of us can pick up the newspapers and understand that president putin, ukraine, the complications with our bilateral relations, our sanctions that we are imposing on the government, there seems to be an International Outcry for much of the activities. But at the same time as dr. Blix mentioned we have work to do on their nuclear capabilities. Not only to fulfill the obligation of the s. T. A. R. T. Treaty, but we need move forward. Can we walk and chew gum at the same time, can we divide this idea of our sanctions as well as you going to negotiate. Help us think about that issue in a wholistic way. Thank you very much, tom. Thank you, also, to hans blix. Very highly respected colleague and someone ive just admired your work so much over the years. But its a great pleasure to be here today and to be on this panel with tom nides, a very good colleague and my boss when he was the deputy secretary of state and with Allison Macfarlane, who is a good friend, but also somebody who is carrying out a very tough job as head of our Nuclear Regulatory commission. And nobody, i think, with the technical chops to do so like allison does now. So, im really honored to be here today. To get at toms question, hans already talked about the very difficult period we are in now with the terrible crisis between russia and ukraine and the International Communitys profound concern about the way russia has really stepped beyond the bounds of International Law in so many ways. I agree very much with what hans says. It simply cannot be excused because International Law, territorial integrity, sovereignty, these are the basic principles on which the order of our planet is maintained. And so when a country steps beyond them in the way that russia has done is really a cause for grave concern. And so i think the power of the sanctions regime is an important way to impact to the kremlin leadership the dire consequences of what they have undertaken in pursuing their seizure of crimea and since the destabilization of eastern ukraine. At the same time, however and i like to stress that historically we have always found at the very top of our National Security challenges, getting our hands around the problem of weapons of mass destruction. How are we going to address this existential threat to the United States, to our allies and partners and to the International Community as a whole . So for that reason, even in the darkest days of the cold war when we faced grave crisis with the soviet union, we always tried to pursue continuing limitations and reductions in Nuclear Weapons. And this was following the cuban missile crisis which did bring us to the brink of nuclear conflagration. So, i think that was a real wakeup call. And leaders since, on both sides of the aisle, republicans and democrats, have recognized that where weapons of mass destruction are concerned, we need to keep pushing that rock uphill no matter what crises are affecting the bilateral or multilateral relationships otherwise. So in that context we have worked very well with russia over the past year to get those chemical weapons out of syria. We have working in cooperation with them and the u. N. Removed 1,300 tons of chemical weapons and nerve agent precursors from syria and they have not been destroyed. If because of this horrible crisis in ukraine we have cut that cooperation off, we would not be where we are today in terms of interNational Security and preventing chemical weapons from falling into the hands of terrorists in that region of the world. So i think thats a great illustration of what im talking about. New s. T. A. R. T. Is another area where we are continuing to work very hard to implement the treaty in the interests of our National Security, first and foremost, getting the number of Nuclear Weapons down to the lowest number since deployed since the dawn of the nuclear age in the 1950s and well continue that process. Now as to whether we can go farther, we need a dance partner. And at the present time the Russian Federation is not will to pick up the very good offer that president obama put on the table last july, when he proposed to the russians that we pursue an up to onethird further reduction in warheads below the numbers in the new s. T. A. R. T. Treaty. New s. T. A. R. T. When its implemented, numbers will be 1,550 deployed Nuclear Warheads. That is still plenty of Nuclear Warheads and we have more work to do to get those numbers lower. So the president s proposal would bring our deployed numbers down somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,000 Nuclear Warheads on both sides. So its a very good proposal, a very good step forward, i believe. But up to this point we dont have a willing dance partner. The russians havent been willing. Even before the crisis in ukraine began, they have not been willing to pick that offer up off the table. So we are continuing to try to make the case with them and also on the international stage. We have the. Nonproliferation treaty review conference coming up. But we will continue to try to work with them and get some further reductions going. Thank you. Well, that was brilliant. I would like, as the owning the microphone for a second, i should tell you as we sit back and look at the precedence thats been written about the issues around syria, much has been written but not enough about the successes of this administration and, quite frankly, the work that you have done to eliminate chemical weapons in syria. That will historically, five years from now, history will be written that we have done the world a great favor. So, dr. Blix, the role russia has played on that has been widely publicized. Do you concur with their role . Do you concur with how they worked with the syrians to get the reduction of those chemical weapons, or did they view it as a way for them to enhance their own position on the world stage . Some would suggest leading to some of their activities in the ukraine. How do you feel about the combination of those two . I think there were great benefits for both sides and for the world in this affair. I do not see the u. S. Really wanting to go in and with a punishing military strikes, bombing syria. Thats what they might have done on various sites, airports, et cetera, and weakened assad. But it would have been a strange thing if theyd done this penalty and thereafter when it was over they say, okay, boys, go back to your fighting now, but fight clean without any chemical weapons. Im not sure that would really stop them but it would have been very awkward. I think what really stopped them was the concern what would develop. Its easy to go in, but you dont know what will develop then. Im afraid that it was not really concern or respect for u. N. Charter rules. I think a punishing expedition would have been illegal. There would have been no support for it in the Security Council. It would have happened without the Security Council support. I dont think it would happen. Now what were the benefits. I think president obama and the u. S. Were taken out of the dlem marks first, by the British Parliament that voted that they would not participate. And secondly, i think in the u. S. Public opinion, the war fatigue and did not want to risk to have more boots on the ground. That was a benefit to get out of this. For the russian side there was another benefit. Russia has two great powers. They have Nuclear Weapons and they have the veto power in the Security Council. And they would like to have such affairs channeled through the Security Council and the organization of interNational Security because they have a seat and influence. So they managed to switch from a unilateral american policeman function to an organized international function where they participate in the Security Council and in the opw. For my part as a lawyer and as someone who wants to see them develop institutions more orderly, i think that was a good part of it. So the world one. It was far better to have the chemical weapons eradicated ail together and without the risk of terrorists grabbing them, than to bomb a few sites and somewhat weakening assad. Ill wrap this series of questions up with one question from me. I was always perplexed when there was a discussion around the destruction of chemical weapons in syria. People talked a little bit, how do you destroy them . Where are you going to move them . They had to be dug up, transported. Rose, dr. Blix, how do i think about that . Well, very quickly, there were socalled priority one chemicals that were more or less direct use, mustard agent, for example, and nerve agent precursors. They were removed from syria and taken to a ship that the u. S. Defense department equipped with a hydrolysis system that basically hydrolyzed, that is diluted with massive amounts of water, these chemicals that then slurry or the remains of that were taken to be treated in a normal commercial industrial disposition facility. And so everything was dealt with in an environmentally safe way. No leakage or problems whatsoever. It was a very solid effort. Then there were a number of chemicals that chemical weapons are very similar to chemical fertilizers. And chemicals that are used in producing chemical weapons are some of the same that go into those industrial processes. So some of the chemicals were not considered so immediately dangerous. They were taken out of the country and taken to commercial sites in the uk, in finland, and also in the United States, at port arthur, and they were destroyed as part of a normal industrial process. So, thats how they were destroyed. Thank you. Youre not off the hook, sorry. Let me just talk a little bit about the work the Nuclear Regulatory commission does. Help the audience think about what you do. When you wake up in the morning and come to work, help this group of scholars understand kind of the role you play today both domestically, internationally as the commission. Great. Thanks for the question. I think this is on. Yep. I really appreciate being here and being able to speak with you all this morning and to interact with you all. Again, as rose said, were good friends. And its a real honor to be here with dr. Blix and with tom. Thank you. So, what the nrc does, the Nuclear Regulatory commission, like other Nuclear Regulatory commissions around the world, ensures the safety and security of Nuclear Materials and Nuclear Facilities in this country. So, it goes beyond just ensuring that Nuclear Reactors are safe and operated safely, that they are constructed safely, but there are over 20,000 Nuclear Materials licensees in the country. They might have experienced some of them during hospital visits. There are a lot of radiographers used in the shale gas fracing field, in oil exploration, in a variety of fields n agriculture, so as well as academia. Maybe some of you have personal experience with this equipment. And these materials. And we ensure that they are safe and secure. We do have an International Role as well thats very important to us. We have both cooperation programs and assistance programs that we do internationally. In cooperation we work a lot with the iaea, the International Atomic energy agency. I was just over there for a week in september for the general conference. And working with my International Counterparts i meet bilaterally with them. Frequently we have cooperative programs where we Work Together. We share personnel. We exchange personnel. We Exchange Knowledge. There are a number of different sort of sub International Programs where we Work Together and Exchange Knowledge but we also provide assistance to a variety of countries as well, countries that are developing their nuclear regulators, countries that are thinking about developing Nuclear Power. We work with them in a variety of ways as well. So one of the real experiences i had was after the disaster in japan. As you all recall, we refer to it as 311, where the fukushima they were hit by two. Both an earthquake and a tsunami and had enormous impact on japan and the people. And the country prior to, that as you know, was determined on a path to provide 50 of their Energy Electricity would be provided by Nuclear Power. So, they were on a pathway because we all know Nuclear Power is a much cleaner Power Generation than many options right now. And once, obviously, fukushima happened, the country stopped their nuclear shut down all the plants. So, help us think about the lessons that we in the United States can learn from how the japanese reacted to the disaster and the things that they may have done right or wrong, and is Nuclear Power the potential of getting japanese back into an area that they need energy from nuclear do you think that is the is that the fast track or a much slower path . Thanks for the question. Is this one working . Thats better. Yeah, you guys were all straining to hear me. So, japan, first of all, i cant speak for the japanese. Im the u. S. Nuclear regulator. But we do work very closely with our japanese counterpart. After the accident they redid, basically from scratch, their nuclear regulator. And we have a very close relationship with the new Japanese Nuclear regulator. Theyve basically been in existence a little over two years and theyve been working incredibly hard to try to develop new standards and get work through the existing facilities, all of which are closed, all the power reactors are closed, and they are in the process of recertifying them. And they have recently issued a renewed license or not a renewed license, but a goahead to the sendai plant. Now its up to the prefecture to approve that. Thats sort of how it works in japan. There were a lot o