Tag Archives: Saudi Arabia and China

Rebranding Saudi Arabia as a Nuclear Superpower

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Saudi Arabia plans to use domestically-sourced uranium to build up its nuclear power industry, energy minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said in January 2023. Saudi Arabia has a nascent nuclear programme that it wants to expand to eventually include uranium enrichment, a sensitive area given its role in nuclear weapons. Riyadh has said it wants to use nuclear power to diversify its energy mix. It is unclear where its ambitions end, since Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said in 2018 that the kingdom would develop nuclear weapons if regional rival Iran did.

“The kingdom intends to utilize its national uranium resources, including in joint ventures with willing partners in accordance with international commitments and transparency standards,” Abdulaziz bin Salman said. He told a mining industry conference in Riyadh that this would involve “the entire nuclear fuel cycle which involves the production of yellowcake, low enriched uranium and the manufacturing of nuclear fuel both for our national use and of course for export“.

Fellow Gulf state the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has the Arab world’s first multi-unit operating nuclear energy plant. The UAE has committed not to enrich uranium itself and not to reprocess spent fuel. Atomic reactors need uranium enriched to around 5% purity, but the same technology in this process can also be used to enrich the heavy metal to higher, weapons-grade levels. This issue has been at the heart of Western and regional concerns about Iran’s nuclear program, and led to the 2015 deal between Tehran and global powers that capped enrichment at 3.67%.

Excerpts from Ahmed Yosri, Saudi Arabia plans to use domestic uranium for nuclear fuel, Reuters, Jan. 11, 2023

The New Alliance: SaudiChina

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Saudi Arabia has imported sensitive missile technology from the Chinese military and is manufacturing its own ballistic missiles…The Saudi government has sought help from the missile branch of the Chinese military, the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force…Ballistic missiles are powered by rockets that propel them in an arch-shaped trajectory upward before descending toward their target on the surface of the earth. They can be used to deploy both conventional and nuclear weapons.

The U.S. has long refused to sell ballistic missiles to Riyadh over proliferation concerns. The kingdom obtained Dong Feng-3 missiles in the 1980s from China and displayed them publicly in 2014. The Chinese military has also transferred multiple batches of finished Dong Feng-series missiles since around 2018 up to as recently as the spring of 2021….China also has helped Saudi Arabia construct a facility to fabricate uranium yellowcake, an early step along the path to a civil nuclear energy program or a nuclear arms capability, the Journal reported last year.

Excerpt from Jared Malsin et al, Saudis Begin Making Ballistic Missiles With Chinese Help, WSJ, Dec. 24, 2021

A Dream Come True? the Saudi Nuclear Program

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Saudi Arabia has constructed with Chinese help a facility for extracting uranium yellowcake from uranium ore, an advance in the oil-rich kingdom’s drive to master nuclear technology…Even though Riyadh is still far from that point, the facility’s exposure appears certain to draw concern in the U.S. Congress, where a bipartisan group of lawmakers has expressed alarm aboutabout Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s 2018 vow that “if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.” ….Saudi Arabia has no known nuclear-weapons program, operating nuclear reactors or capacity to enrich uranium. But it says it wants to acquire nuclear plants that Saudi authorities say will generate power and reduce its reliance on oil, its principal export…

“Yellowcake” is a milled form of uranium ore which occurs naturally in Saudi Arabia and neighboring countries such as Jordan. It is produced by chemically processing uranium ore into a fine powder. It takes multiple additional steps and technology to process and enrich uranium sufficiently for it to power a civil nuclear energy plant. At very high enrichment levels, uranium can fuel a nuclear weapon…Olli Heinonen said that…yellowcake facility alone wouldn’t mark a significant advance unless the yellowcake is converted into a compound known as uranium hexafluoride and then enriched. But Mr. Heinonen said of the Saudis, “Where is the transparency? If you claim your program is peaceful, why not show what you have?”

One Western official said the facility is located in a remote desert location in the general vicinity of al Ula, a small city in northwest Saudi Arabia. Two officials said it was constructed with the help of two Chinese entities. While the identities of these entities couldn’t be learned, the China National Nuclear Corp. signed a memorandum of understanding with Saudi Arabia in 2017 to help explore its uranium deposits. A second agreement was signed with China Nuclear Engineering Group Corp. That followed a 2012 pact announced between Riyadh and Beijing to cooperate on peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Riyadh has expressed a desire to master all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle. It is constructing with Argentina’s state-owned nuclear technology company a small research reactor outside of Riyadh. In recent years, the Saudis have significantly expanded their nuclear workforce, experts say, through academic nuclear engineering programs and growing research centers. In addition to its agreement with Argentina, the Saudis are collaborating with South Korea in refining the design of a small commercial reactor to be built in Saudi Arabia, and that could also be marketed to other nations in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. It also has public cooperation agreements with Jordan on uranium mining and production.

Excerpts from  Warren P. Strobel et al., Saudi Arabia, With China’s Help, Expands Its Nuclear Program, WSJ, Aug. 4, 2020

The World in its Pocket: Saudi Arabia as a Nuclear Power

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New satellite imagery shows that construction on an experimental nuclear  reactor in Saudi Arabia  is making”expeditious” progress — just three months after the Kingdom announced plans to build it…  The Kingdom has been open about its nuclear program with the IAEA, which sent a team to Saudi Arabia last July to check on building plans. It has repeatedly pledged that the program is peaceful. But Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said last year that “without a doubt if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.”
 
Also raising concern among industry experts and some in Congress is the Saudi insistence that it should be allowed to produce its own nuclear fuel, rather than import it under strict conditions.  In an interview last year, Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al Falih said: “It’s not natural for us to bring enriched uranium from a foreign country to fuel our reactors,” citing the country’s uranium reservess.  Saudi Arabia went public with its nuclear ambitions nine years ago, but the plans have gone into overdrive as part of the Crown Prince’s “Vision 2030” — a strategy to wean Saudi Arabia off its reliance on oil and diversify both the economy and its energy mix.  Companies that help Saudi Arabia with its nuclear ambitions  are US, China, Russia, France and South Korea. Saudi Arabia has also signed agreements with the China National Nuclear Corporation for exploring uranium reserves in the Kingdom…

In heated exchanges at the Senate Armed Services committee at the end of March, US Energy Secretary Rick Perry said that if the United States did not cooperate with the Saudis, they would look to Russia or China to develop their nuclear industry.  “I can assure you that those two countries don’t give a tinker’s damn about nuclear non-proliferation,” Perry said.

Excerpts from Saudi nuclear program accelerates, raising tensions in a volatile region, CNN, Apr. 7, 2019

The Secret Powers of Saudi Arabia — Murder not Included

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In 2016 Muhammad bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s crown prince and de facto ruler, announced the latest stage of “Saudisation”—the replacement of foreign workers with Saudi ones. It now appears the policy does not stop at swapping out bankers and bakers, but extends to ballistic missiles.  Satellite photos analysed by researchers from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, and reported by the Washington Post, appear to show that Saudi Arabia has been building a factory for rocket engines, at an existing missile base in al-Watah, south-west of Riyadh. It seems to be configured for solid-fuel rockets, which can be launched more quickly than liquid-fuelled ones….he rocket factory was “designed, equipped and constructed by an outside entity”. Saudi Arabia has “no capacity” for such a project. The facility, he notes, closely resembles a Chinese one in Lantian.

Saudi Arabia is no newcomer to missiles. Having watched Iran and Iraq fling them at each other during the 1980s, it bought a few dozen df-3 missiles from China in 1987. It came close to unleashing them after being struck by Iraqi Scud missiles during the Gulf war in 1991. In the 2000s it probably picked up a batch of newer, more accurate Chinese df-21s.

Iran, the kingdom’s arch-rival, has been honing its missile force despite Western opposition and un rebukes, conducting 135 test launches since 1990. On December 1st, 2018  it tested one thought capable of comfortably reaching any corner of Saudi soil….Nor is Iran the only concern. Hizbullah, a Lebanese militant group nurtured and armed by Iran, has a growing arsenal of missiles; some can already reach the north-western parts of Saudi Arabia. Israel is also armed to the teeth. Though Prince Muhammad is on good terms with the Jewish state, satellite images published in 2013 reportedly showed that one of the Saudi df-3 launching pads at al-Watah was set in the direction of Tel Aviv.

Because missiles are ideal delivery systems for nuclear weapons, news of the plant has also revived worries about Saudi Arabia’s atomic intentions…Without a doubt if Iran developed a nuclear bomb,” warned Prince Muhammad last March, “we will follow suit

So the Saudis may turn to other nuclear friends. Western diplomats and spooks have long been concerned that Pakistan, whose own nuclear programme was bankrolled by Saudi Arabia, might be a ready supplier of know-how, fuel or bombs. In 1999 Saudi Arabia’s then defence minister horrified American officials by touring Pakistan’s nuclear facilities and meeting A.Q. Khan, the scientist who sold nuclear technology to North Korea, Iran and Libya. Ties remain close. Prince Muhammad was due to agree on $14bn of investment in Pakistan during a visit to the country on February 16th.  2019. ….

Excerpts from Protection rocket Saudi Arabia’s missile race, Economist, Feb. 16, 2019

After Khashoggi: the Saudi Missiles

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Satellite images suggest that Saudi Arabia has constructed its first known ballistic missile factory, according to weapons experts and image analysts, a development that raises questions about the kingdom’s increasing military and nuclear ambitions under its 33-year-old crown prince.  If operational, the suspected factory at a missile base in al-Watah, southwest of Riyadh, would allow Saudi Arabia to manufacture its own ballistic missiles, fueling fears of an arms race against its regional rival Iran.  Saudi Arabia currently does not possess nuclear weapons, so any missiles produced at the apparent factory are likely to be conventionally armed. But a missile-making facility would be a critical component of any eventual Saudi nuclear weapons program, hypothetically giving the kingdom capability to produce the preferred delivery systems for nuclear warheads.

Two additional missile experts who reviewed the satellite images for The Washington Post… agreed that the high-resolution photographs of the al-Watah site appear to depict a ­rocket-engine production and test facility, probably using solid fuel…The complex…highlights the nation’s intention to make its own advanced missiles after years of seeking to purchase them abroad, at times successfully….

Saudi Arabia has been pursuing a nuclear power-plant deal with the United States that would potentially include allowing it to produce nuclear fuel. The kingdom’s insistence on domestic fuel production has raised worries among U.S. officials that the kingdom wants the atomic power project not only for civil use but also for covert weapon-making purposes. ..

How the Saudis obtained the technological expertise necessary to build the facility is unclear. One potential supplier: China…China has sold ballistic missiles to Saudi Arabia in the past and has helped supply ballistic missile production capabilities to other nations. In the 1990s, Pakistan secretly built a plant for medium-range missiles using blueprints and equipment supplied by China. The factory in Pakistan has long drawn the attention of top Saudi officials. ..

The main way the United States seeks to prevent the spread of drone and missile technology is through the Missile Technology Control Regime, or the MTCR, an informal multicountry pact designed to prevent the transfer of certain missile technologies. China is not a member but has agreed to abide by some of its stipulations.   While the United States sells an array of weaponry to Saudi Arabia, Washington has not sold ballistic missiles to Riyadh, in part because such missiles traditionally have been seen as destabilizing for the region. Saudi Arabia has turned to China in the past when met with refusals from the United States for certain weapons requests.

For example, the United States declined repeated Saudi requests to purchase what are known as category-one American drones, including Predators and Reapers, partly because of MTCR’s regulations. Instead, the kingdom turned to China, first purchasing drones and later striking a deal in which China will build a drone factory that will produce a Chinese copycat of the Predator in Saudi Arabia.

Excerpts Paul Sonne, Can Saudi Arabia produce ballistic missiles? Satellite imagery raises suspicions, Washington Post, Jan. 22, 2019