In a pre-dawn operation on 22 August, enough high-enriched uranium to make at least two atom bombs was moved from Belgrade, Serbia to Russia. The US government plans a further 24 operations of this type to prevent terrorists from gaining access to the material needed to make nuclear weapons.
(572.5429) WISE Amsterdam - The operation, involving 1,200 troops, was kept secret, and only became public when residents of Belgrade telephoned radio stations at 2 a.m. to report that they had seen special police with gas masks and helicopters flying overhead. It involved moving over 5,000 unused fuel rods containing a total of about 50 kg (110 lbs) of 80% enriched uranium from the Vinca nuclear research institute to the Ulyanovsk Nuclear Processing Plant in Russia. The fuel had been in storage since 1984, when a reactor at the institute was closed (see WISE News Communique 468.4655, "Proliferation and explosion dangers in Belgrade").
The operation was a unique joint initiative of the governments of Russia, Serbia (Yugoslavia) and the US, together with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI).
Securing the unused fuel is only one phase of the operation; a second phase involves dealing with the irradiated fuel and decommissioning the reactor. In the second phase, the involvement of the NTI is essential, since US law forbids spending government money on this. The NTI - a private foundation co-founded by former US Senator Sam Nunn and media mogul Ted Turner - has committed up to US$5 million for the project.
A senior US State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that there are a further 24 sites around the world which have been targeted for similar operations. The official refused to name any sites but said, "We want to get at all of them. And some of them are going to be a lot more pernicious than others".
The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) report Closing the Gaps: Securing Highly Enriched Uranium identifies Vinca as a high priority site, and mentions a further reactor in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. This reactor, like several former Soviet reactors, has now been converted to run on uranium of 36% enrichment. At this enrichment level, 150 kg of uranium is needed to make a nuclear bomb, so the proliferation threat is still present, but lower. Fully eliminating the proliferation risk requires the use of low-enriched uranium (containing less than 20% U-235). However, for the Tashkent reactor this is not the only problem, since it reportedly has some old stocks of high-enriched uranium, which urgently need to be removed to a more secure area.
Some research reactors have still not converted to use uranium of lower enrichment, and the FAS report highlights the need to either convert them or close them down. Reactors of Soviet design that still use 80% enriched uranium include reactors in the Czech Republic and Libya.
While the report focuses on reactors of Soviet design, it is important to remember that many Western research reactors also still use high-enriched uranium, for example in the Netherlands (see WISE/NIRS Nuclear Monitor 562.5366, "Petten reactor to 'convert' to High Enriched Uranium?"). The only new research reactor to use this fuel is the FRM-2 reactor near Munich, Germany (see WISE/NIRS Nuclear Monitor 566, "In Brief"), which continues to be a target of protest.
Source: World Information Service on Energy
