- SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -
International researchers have compiled what they say is the world's most
complete database of lost, stolen, and misplaced nuclear material, depicting
a world awash in weapons-grade uranium and plutonium that nobody can account
for.
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- "It truly is frightening," said Lyudmila Zaitseva,
a visiting fellow at Stanford University's Institute for International
Studies (IIS). "I think this is the tip of the iceberg."
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- Stanford announced its database as U.S. senators held
a hearing in Washington to assess the threat of "dirty bombs,"
or radioactive material dispersed by conventional explosives.
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- The Stanford program, dubbed the Database on Nuclear
Smuggling, Theft, and Orphan Radiation Sources (DSTO), is intended to help
governments and international agencies track wayward nuclear material worldwide,
supplementing existing national programs which often fail to share information.
The project took on added urgency following the Sept. 11 assaults on New
York and Washington, which spurred fears that extremist groups might seek
to use nuclear weapons in future attacks.
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- "It blows the mind, the lack of information,"
said George Bunn, a veteran arms control negotiator and a member of the
database group. "What we're trying to say is, 'What are the facts?'"
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- CHILLING FACTS
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- The facts, even on cursory examination, are chilling.
Zaitseva said that, over the past ten years, at least 40 kilograms (88
pounds) of weapons-usable uranium and plutonium had been stolen from poorly
protected nuclear facilities in the former Soviet Union. While most of
this material was subsequently retrieved, at least 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds)
of highly enriched uranium stolen from a reactor in Georgia remains missing
and unaccounted for.
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- Other thefts have included several fuel rods that disappeared
from a research reactor in the Congo in the mid-1990s. While one of these
fuel rods later resurfaced in Italy, reportedly in the hands of the Mafia,
the other has not been found.
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- The Stanford group, led by nuclear physicist and arms
control researcher Friedrich Steinhausler, decided to form its database
after becoming alarmed at how patchy most of the available information
was. Combining data from two existing unclassified databases and adding
new information from sources ranging from government agencies to local
media reports, the team has evaluated each entry for accuracy and probability.
"You'd be surprised how much scientific junk is in the existing databases,
from mixing up units to reporting on tertiary sources," Steinhausler
said.
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- "ORPHAN" RADIATION ALSO A THREAT
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- The database includes both illicitly obtained weapons-grade
nuclear material as well as "orphaned" radiation sources "
scientific or medical material that may have been lost, misplaced, or simply
thrown away but which still poses a health and security threat.
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- Steinhausler said the DSTO database would be open only
to approved researchers and that the Stanford group was beginning to contact
government agencies in the United States and Europe about sharing information
to build more effective international supervision of nuclear material.
"We cannot supply the means to improve the situation," Steinhausler
said in a statement. "We're pinpointing weaknesses and loopholes and
saying, 'do something about it.'"
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- Zaitseva, visiting Stanford from the Kazakhstan National
Nuclear Center, said the database was helping to build a dim picture of
the market for stolen uranium, plutonium, and other dangerous materials.
But she added that while, in many cases, those behind nuclear thefts can
be identified, the ultimate destination of the nuclear material has remained
a mystery. "We haven't found a single occasion in which the actual
end users have been caught," said Zaitseva. "We can only guess
by the routes where the material is going. We can't say for sure if it
is Iraq, Iran, North Korea, al Qaeda, or Hezbollah. We can only make assumptions."
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- She added that the dangers of an unsupervised, underground
market in nuclear material were likely to grow, noting that a U.S.-sponsored
program to secure nuclear components in the former Soviet Union had thus
far only locked up about one-third of an estimated 600 tons of weapons-usable
material. "It's just not protected," she said. "This is
hot stuff. If you steal 20 kilograms of that material, you can build a
nuclear weapon."
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- Copyright 2002, Reuters
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