12-04-10 Ukraine gives up its uraniumToday,Ukraine announced a landmark decision to get rid of all of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium by the time of the next Nuclear Security Summit in 2012.Ukraine intends to remove a substantial part of its stocks this year.Ukraine will convert its civil nuclear research facilities -- operate with low-enriched uranium fuel.This is something that the United States has tried to make happen for more than 10 years.The material is enough to construct several nuclear weapons.In the past,nuclear material that originated from the Soviet Union has been returned to Russia,just as American fissile material donated under Atoms for Peace is repatriated to the US.But Gibbs appeared to suggest that Ukraine's HEU,taken from the weapons it sent back to Russia in 1994,might not be taking the normal route. |
