THE United States and Russia have set up a joint task force to prevent terrorists from acquiring radioactive substances for use in building weapons of mass destruction, US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said.
The primary mission of the new group, announced on Thursday after three days of talks between Abraham and Russian Nuclear Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev, will be to identify radioactive materials used in civilian activities such as medicine that terrorists could try to acquire.
It will also monitor substances used in the nuclear industry and reinforce security measures to prevent them from being stolen.
The effort will be financed initially by the US Department of Energy, Abraham said.
”We now expect to complete the work of protecting some 600 tons of fissile material by 2008, a full two years earlier than we expected at this time last year,” he said, noting deepening cooperation between Washington and Moscow on the effort.
”Perhaps the most important step we took this week was an agreement to work together to improve the security of radiological sources that might be used to develop so-called ‘dirty bombs’,” he said.
Several senior US intelligence officials in February expressed alarm at the fact that weapons-grade nuclear material had been on several instances stolen from Russian facilities.
Their announcement came amid warnings by top US officials that Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida terrorist network had been making a concerted effort to obtain the know-how and materials to manufacture a crude nuclear or radiological device. ? Sapa-AFP