Top News: U.S. envoy arrives in South Korea as North Korea rejects talks Reuters Iranian parliament to debate bill to leave NPT Additional Protocol Foreign Brief IAEA says radiation spike was likely from an active reactor New Europe United States NNSA sites confirmed 13 new COVID-19 cases before holiday Exchange Monitor7/7/20 The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was tracking 13 new cases of COVID-19 across the civilian nuclear weapons enterprise last week ahead of the Independence Day holiday. House slides money into B-21 bomber procurement account Defense News7/4/20 An amendment to the House version of the fiscal 2021 defense policy bill would move some funding for the secretive B-21 bomber program from its research and development account to procurement, a sign that production activities could be picking up. East Asia U.S. envoy arrives in South Korea as North Korea rejects talks Reuters7/6/20 A U.S. envoy arrived in South Korea on Tuesday in an effort to renew stalled nuclear talks with North Korea, hours after it issued a statement saying it has no intention of sitting down with the United States and told South Korea to “stop meddling”. N. Korea says it feels no need to ‘sit face to face with U.S.’ Yonhap7/4/20 North Korea feels no need to meet with the United States for talks, a top diplomat of the communist nation said Saturday, accusing Washington of taking advantage of dialogue between the two countries only as “a tool for grappling its political crisis.” OPINION: Why is the DPRK increasingly uninterested in talks with the U.S.? CGTNGabriela Bernal 7/5/20 The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) does not feel a need to sit down with the United States for the time being, DPRK’s first Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Choe Son Hui said on July 4. According to her, talks with the U.S. would be nothing more than “a political tool” for Washington, and she is right. Middle East Iranian parliament to debate bill to leave NPT Additional Protocol Foreign Brief7/6/20 Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad-Zarif will today appear before parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, which is pushing to end Iran’s voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Russia and Europe Russian village in ‘danger zone’ of possible nuclear missile test Popular Mechanics7/6/20 A tiny village in northern Russia is back in the global spotlight again after its residents were warned they were in the “danger zone” for an upcoming military activity. IAEA says radiation spike was likely from an active reactor New Europe7/6/20 The International Atomic Energy Agency said that the slightly elevated levels of radioactivity detected last week in northern Europe were likely related to an active nuclear reactor. Russia remains committed to nuclear test ban – Foreign Ministry Tass7/4/20 The Foreign Ministry pointed out that “the US allegations that Russia allegedly violated the nuclear testing moratorium by conducting nuclear experiments inconsistent with the US ‘zero-yield’ standard are not expectedly substantiated by evidence.”