a truckload of suitcases
Georgia To Receive Technical Aid On Smuggled Nuclear Materials
Tbilisi (AFP) Mar 12, 2002 - The United States is to provide technical aid to Georgia to prevent the trafficking of nuclear components as part of its war against international terrorism, the head of Georgia's frontier police, Valery Chkheidze, said Tuesday.
"We have information concerning attempts to smuggle nuclear components across our territory. The American side is already supplying us with methodological aid, and will soon provide us with special equipment," Chkheidze told reporters.
Representatives from the United States, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Ukraine, along with officials of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are attending an international conference on the issue in Tbilisi, which opened Tuesday.
Last month the IAEA expressed concern at the discovery in Georgia of two cylinders containing strontium-90, a radioactive material which, combined with conventional explosives, could be used by terrorists to produce a "dirty" nuclear bomb.
Last month Georgia said it was to receive US military aid in training its armed forces in the fight against terrorism.
Washington believes that some members of the al-Qaeda network, held responsible for the September 11 attacks in the United States, have taken refuge in the lawless Pankisi Gorge region of northern Georgia. |
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) approved Tuesday an action plan boosting anti-terrorist security for nuclear power plants worldwide, but called urgently for money to fund the initiative.
Several countries have already pledged contributions to the plan, launched after the September 11 terror attacks, but not nearly as much as the UN atomic watchdog needs, said IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei.
"There is wide recognition that the international physical protection regime needs to be strengthened," he told a board of governors meeting at the agency's Vienna headquarters which approved the plan "in principle."
The IAEA launched a broad initiative last September to boost nuclear safety, expressing fears notably that terrorists could attack a nuclear facility or obtain materials to build a nuclear or radioactive bomb.
A number of countries, including Austria, Britain, Japan, the Netherlands, Slovenia and the United States have already contributed sums totally over two million dollars to a special fund for the plan, said an IAEA statement.
But the figures so far pledged fall well short of the IAEA estimate of over 30 million dollars per year for its programmes and "to enable the Agency to respond to urgent situations that require immediate security upgrades."
"The board of governors called upon IAEA Member States to contribute to the fund as a matter of urgency," said the statement.
The IAEA statement said the first line of defense against nuclear terrorism "is the strong physical protection of nuclear facilities and materials" -- and reiterated concerns about this.
"National measures for protecting nuclear material and facilities are uneven in their substance and application," it said.
