The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has authorized the Brazilian government to start an experimental uranium-enrichment program in December at the state-owned Resende enrichment facility in southeastern Brazil. Brasilia and the IAEA solved a year-long dispute over the agency's access to Resende on Nov. 17-19, when IAEA inspectors entered Resende to verify it would be used for only peaceful purposes. IAEA Executive Director Mohamed ElBaradei said Nov. 25 his agency is satisfied that Brazil will not try to develop nuclear weapons. The IAEA then gave Brazil the green light to start producing 20 percent enriched uranium. The agreement marks the official revival of Brazil's nuclear-development program, which President Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva's government considers a top strategic priority. Though da Silva's ambitions to revive Brazil's nuclear-development programs are hamstrung by federal financial constraints, the president is banking on a broad technological and financial alliance with Russia to help Brazil make a quantum leap forward in nuclear and space technology and military modernization. Brazil has a 50-year history of nuclear research and development for civilian and defense purposes — including a secret nuclear-weapons program that operated under military control from the mid-1970s until the end of the 1980s. Brazil already generates electricity with nuclear reactors, has research reactors and has uranium enrichment capability with centrifugation technology developed by Brazilian scientists under military control. During the 1990s, however, Brazil's nuclear research capabilities suffered a brain drain as the government made deep cuts in defense and nuclear science budgets — a factor from which Brazil's nuclear industry has not yet recovered. Russia is eager to tap into the Brazilian nuclear-development industry. Russian President Vladimir Putin said during his recent visit to Brazil that Russian companies are interested in helping the Brazilian government build a third nuclear power plant at the Angra dos Reis complex in Rio de Janeiro state. Nuclear technology sales to Brazil, combined with increasing Russian-Brazilian cooperation in other areas, would generate hard currency and advance Moscow's drive to boost exports of high-value, high-technology Russian goods. Closer Russian-Brazilian ties also would enhance Moscow's geopolitical influence in Latin America. Da Silva's decision to revive Brazil's nuclear-development program has both economic and geopolitical implications. Da Silva wants Brazil to achieve self-sufficiency in the production of enriched uranium for the Angra dos Reis nuclear power plants by 2010. He also wants to make Brazil, which has 310,000 metric tons of proven uranium reserves, a force in the global market for enriched uranium used in nuclear power plants. A strong national nuclear industry also would be strategically advantageous to da Silva's foreign policy, which seeks to establish Brazil as the dominant regional power in Latin America. Brazilians have long viewed their country as an important player in global politics, but also feel that Brazil does not get the respect it deserves from countries such as the United States. However, vigorous and economically successful high-technology industries such as nuclear power and commercial spaceflight would, in the minds of many Brazilians, increase Brazil's global geopolitical profile and its international influence. Even if Brazil never takes a step toward building nuclear weapons, a vigorous nuclear industry with the theoretical capability to build such weapons likely would compel larger powers such as the United States to manage relations with Brazil more carefully. Brazilian Science and Technology Minister Eduardo Campos claims Brazil has a competitive advantage in the global export market for enriched uranium. The United States and France cover about 55 percent of the world demand for enriched uranium, employing a gaseous diffusion enrichment technology that uses 25 times more energy than Brazil's centrifugation technology. Russia supplies nearly 30 percent of the global market for enriched uranium with a centrifugation technology based on machines that are smaller and less efficient than Brazil's, according to Campos. With global electricity demand expected to increase nearly 500 percent over the next five decades, the IAEA forecasts that nuclear reactor capacity could quadruple by 2050. Brazil expects to be a major supplier of enriched uranium as the world's nuclear power capacity increases. U.S. President George W. Bush's administration is not yet challenging Brazil's push to revive its nuclear programs. However, this likely could change if Washington concludes that Brazil is developing nuclear capabilities for purposes other than peaceful civilian use. During a visit to Brazil in October, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the U.S. government accepts that Brazil has "no desire, plans or interest" in developing nuclear weapons, but rather seeks to develop a nuclear-power program for peaceful purposes. Powell also said he did not believe "'the IAEA or the U.S. or anyone else" wants to see Brazil give away any of its "proprietary knowledge" on nuclear matters "that [Brazil] believes it should hold close." Brazil's government maintains that its nuclear development program is completely peaceful. However, since the Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) came into effect in 1970, every state that has sought to develop nuclear weapons — including Israel, India, Pakistan and, according to its government, North Korea — has done so on the back of peaceful nuclear research programs. Moreover, Brazil has a history of secretly trying to develop nuclear weapons. Brazil and West Germany signed an agreement on June 27, 1975, to transfer to Brazil eight nuclear reactors with an individual capacity of 1,300 megawatts, a commercial-scale uranium-enrichment facility, a small pilot plant to reprocess plutonium and Becker "jet nozzle" uranium enrichment and processing. The agreement also called for the first-ever transfer of technology for a complete nuclear fuel cycle including enrichment and reprocessing. The U.S. government opposed the agreement but failed to block it. Soon after the agreement with West Germany was signed, Brazil's government secretly transferred the technology it had obtained for its power plant projects to a secret program established in 1975 to develop an atomic bomb. The project was code-named "Solimoes" and was controlled entirely by the armed forces. However, it quickly became known as the "Parallel Program." Each branch of the Brazilian armed forces had a specific role. The navy developed centrifuges for uranium enrichment, the army worked on plutonium production reactors and the air force engaged in uranium laser research, nuclear weapons design and construction of a nuclear test site. The navy program was the only successful effort. The navy built a laboratory-scale uranium centrifuge plant, followed by a commercial-scale plant at its Aramar Research Center in Ipero. This program was secretly expanded. In 1987, President Jose Sarney acknowledged that Brazil had enriched uranium on a laboratory scale to 20 percent. Argentina's nuclear-development programs in the 1970s were the main factor driving Brazilian weapons-development programs. The two countries were ruled by military governments and viewed each other as major enemies. However, by the late 1980s the election of democratic governments in both countries, combined with the retreat of militarism, growing bilateral trade relations and the need to divert budget resources from defense to other spending priorities, undercut political support in Brazil for nuclear weapons programs. Even so, Brazil renounced nuclear-weapons development with great reluctance. In 1988, Brazil promulgated a new constitution that required congressional approval for all nuclear-related activities. This closed the door on secret weapons programs and forced the military to divulge the full extent of the country's nuclear "parallel program." This constitutional ban was reinforced in 1990 and 1991 through treaties with Argentina. In 1994, the Brazilian government ratified the Treaty of Tlatelolco, banning nuclear weapons in the Americas; in 1997, Brazil finally agreed with considerable reluctance to ratify the NPT. Brazilian diplomats argued the NPT was discriminatory because it excludes the capabilities of those already in the nuclear weapons club. Furthermore, some Brazilians argued the NPT was an infringement on their national sovereignty. Though the IAEA and Washington are not opposing Brazil's decision to restart its nuclear-development programs, nonproliferation activists are not backing down and likely will seek aggressively to curtail Brazil's program. Their efforts will not succeed in stopping Brazil's nuclear ambitions. Campos says Resende's centrifugation technology can enrich uranium only up to 20 percent, while weapons-grade uranium must be at least 90 percent enriched. The IAEA's nuclear experts are satisfied that Brazil cannot produce weapons-grade enriched uranium. However, nonproliferation activists charge — without offering supportive evidence — that Resende has the technological potential to give Brazil the capacity to produce five to six implosion devices a year. By 2010, with the planned increases in capacity, Resende could give Brazil the capacity to make 26 to 31 bombs a year, rising to 53 to 63 bombs a year by 2014. Brazil's government dismisses these charges. The country is bound internationally and regionally by multiple agreements that renounce nuclear-weapons development and place strict international safeguards on the country's nuclear facilities, foreign ministry officials say. Da Silva's government insists that Brazil has the right to develop its nuclear industry and export its uranium resources for peaceful purposes. However, before he was elected president in October 2002, da Silva also criticized the 1970 NPT as unfair. After da Silva was elected, then-Science and Technology Minister Roberto Amaral was compelled to resign after implying publicly that Brazil should not renounce the possibility of developing nuclear weapons. Brazil's immediate goals might be driven by economic need, including the effort to achieve self-sufficiency in enriched uranium production and capture a significant share of the world market for enriched uranium. It is possible Brazil will never try again to develop nuclear weapons. However, as its nuclear industry grows in coming years, Brazil will edge much closer to the point where it can design and build its own nuclear weapons — if the country's civilian and military leaders make a political decision to do so despite the multiple treaties that ban Brazil legally from building such weapons.