Dirty bombUkrainian security services stop criminal gang from selling uranium

Published 6 August 2015

The security services of Ukraine say they have seized a small quantity of ore-grade uranium from a criminal gang in the western part of the country. The State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said the group had been trying to sell the uranium-238 isotope to an unknown client when they were arrested. Ukrainian media has recently reported of speculations about pro-Russian rebels’ ability to develop a “dirty” bomb which would use conventional explosives to scatter lethal radioactive fallout.

The security services of Ukraine say they have seized a small quantity of ore-grade uranium from a criminal gang in the western part of the country.

The State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said the group had been trying to sell the uranium-238 isotope to an unknown client when they were arrested.

The police arrested the suspects on Wednesday, and the arrest was immediately reported to the president, Petro Poroshenko. “Four members of a criminal group that was trying to sell the nuclear material were detained with the evidence in hand,” Interfax quoted an SBU statement as saying. “According to preliminary information, the nuclear matter was uranium-238.”

The U-238 isotope is the most commonly occurring in nature and. It is radioactive, but it is not fissile so it cannot be used directly to create a nuclear chain reaction or explosion.

The Guardian reports that Ukrainian media has recently reported of speculations about pro-Russian rebels’ ability to develop a “dirty” bomb which would use conventional explosives to scatter lethal radioactive fallout.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in December 1991 and the Red Army hastily, and in a disorganized fashion, withdrew from Ukraine , Ukraine found itself in possession of a small nuclear arsenal which was left behind. After lengthy negotiations, Ukraine agreed to return the nuclear warheads to Russia in exchange for a generous economic aid package from the United States. Ukraine, however, still has nuclear materials storage facilities and disposal sites for nuclear waste from nuclear power reactors.

The Ukrainian authorities that the uranium was seized in a region in the heart of Ukraine’s nationalistic west, which has been untouched by the 16-month separatist war to the east.