Feral Jundi

   Boy, I had no idea that those sites were still buried and containing Uranium.  I would have thought that these sites would have been cleaned up, as opposed to just sitting there buried.  And what was the UN thinking?  Sure it is sealed up in containers and buried, but the problem is that Saddam had the stuff.  Now I know back in the eighties, we supported Iraq’s nuclear ambitions, kind of.  But Israel didn’t, and we all know that story.  

     But as soon as Saddam become an enemy of the region and the US in the nineties, then all bets were off.  The UN and the world should have insisted that Saddam take care of this material and hand it over.  We focused so much on the other stuff that Saddam had back then, but I had no idea that this ‘nuclear material’ was still buried and just sitting there.  You learn something new every day.  -Head Jundi 

 Remains of a facility used for Iraq’s clandestine nuclear weapons program. The IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) examined the site following the Persian Gulf War (1990–91)

AP Exclusive: US removes uranium from Iraq

Sat, Jul 5, 2008 (11:15 a.m.)

The last major remnant of Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program _ a huge stockpile of concentrated natural uranium _ reached a Canadian port Saturday to complete a secret U.S. operation that included a two-week airlift from Baghdad and a ship voyage crossing two oceans.

The removal of 550 metric tons of “yellowcake” _ the seed material for higher-grade nuclear enrichment _ was a significant step toward closing the books on Saddam’s nuclear legacy. It also brought relief to U.S. and Iraqi authorities who had worried the cache would reach insurgents or smugglers crossing to Iran to aid its nuclear ambitions.

What’s now left is the final and complicated push to clean up the remaining radioactive debris at the former Tuwaitha nuclear complex about 12 miles south of Baghdad _ using teams that include Iraqi experts recently trained in the Chernobyl fallout zone in Ukraine.

“Everyone is very happy to have this safely out of Iraq,” said a senior U.S. official who outlined the nearly three-month operation to The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.

While yellowcake alone is not considered potent enough for a so-called “dirty bomb” _ a conventional explosive that disperses radioactive material _ it could stir widespread panic if incorporated in a blast. Yellowcake also can be enriched for use in reactors and, at higher levels, nuclear weapons using sophisticated equipment.

The Iraqi government sold the yellowcake to a Canadian uranium producer, Cameco Corp., in a transaction the official described as worth “tens of millions of dollars.” A Cameco spokesman, Lyle Krahn, declined to discuss the price, but said the yellowcake will be processed at facilities in Ontario for use in energy-producing reactors.

“We are pleased … that we have taken (the yellowcake) from a volatile region into a stable area to produce clean electricity,” he said.

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