{"id":11828,"date":"2013-11-20T08:08:13","date_gmt":"2013-11-20T08:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/praag.org\/?p=11828"},"modified":"2013-11-20T08:13:45","modified_gmt":"2013-11-20T08:13:45","slug":"stolen-uranium-prompts-sa-probe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praag.org\/?p=11828","title":{"rendered":"Stolen uranium prompts SA probe"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"uraniumore\"<\/a>South African police have launched an investigation into how two Mozambican men obtained a kilogramme of uranium which they tried to sell in Durban, a spokesman said Tuesday.<\/p>\n

“We’re trying to establish which mine it came from and how it came into the hands of the culprits,” said police spokesman Colonel Jay Naicker, who described the uranium as a raw mined product.<\/p>\n

The two men, both in their early 20s, were arrested last week with the uranium and 90 ecstasy tablets.<\/p>\n

They appeared in court on Monday charged with being in possession of the drugs and the kilo (about two pounds) of uranium.<\/p>\n

The case has heightened fears over the illicit trade in enriched materials that could be used in dirty bombs.<\/p>\n

“We would have to establish whether it’s just a small batch that they got their hands on or whether they’ve got access to more of the stuff,” Naicker said.<\/p>\n

The South African Nuclear Energy Corporation (NECSA) confirmed that the substance was uranium and is testing its isotopic identity and levels.<\/p>\n

“In order to produce a dirty bomb, one would have to obtain certain amounts of enrichment on the uranium,” Elliot Mulane, NECSA spokesman, told AFP.<\/p>\n

“These tests will reveal the enrichment levels of the material, and with that revelation we will be able to confirm whether it can be used in a dirty bomb or in other clandestine or illegal activities.”<\/p>\n

However, he said it was unlikely that highly enriched — that is, weapons-grade — material would have been sold on the street.<\/p>\n

“Highly enriched uranium worldwide is stored in very, very high-security areas, and the chances that anyone could lay their hands on these materials are almost nil,” he said.<\/p>\n

“So I’m not very concerned about highly enriched uranium ending up in the wrong places.”<\/p>\n

Uranium trafficking is rare, with only five such cases in the past 20 years, Mulane said.<\/p>\n

But he admitted that the theft was “a concern”, citing the issue of safeguards at mines and fears over the possible toxicity of the substance.<\/p>\n

The material is likely to have come from a mine, possibly not within South Africa.<\/p>\n

South Africa has the continent’s only nuclear power plant, but several countries have significant uranium deposits and mining activities.<\/p>\n

The results of the tests on the uranium are expected Thursday.<\/p>\n

International atomic bodies have been informed of the seizure.<\/p>\n

The men were remanded in custody until December 3 for a bail application. – Sapa\/AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South African police have launched an investigation into how two Mozambican men obtained a kilogramme of uranium which they tried to sell in Durban, a spokesman said Tuesday. “We’re trying to establish which mine it came from and how it came into the hands of the culprits,” said police spokesman Colonel Jay Naicker, who described … Continue reading “Stolen uranium prompts SA probe”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11832,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[7480,3890,4959],"class_list":["post-11828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-south-africa","tag-ecstasy-tablets","tag-mozambicans","tag-uranium"],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/praag.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/uraniumore.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11828"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11828\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11833,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11828\/revisions\/11833"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}