US studying plan to get HEU out of civilian use: IAEA chief meets Bush

[54anickel]

http://www.hipakistan.com/en/detail.php?newsId=en57951&F_catID=&f_type=source

WASHINGTON: The United States is working on an "action plan" to get countries worldwide to stop using highly enriched uranium , which can be the raw material for nuclear weapons, in civilian programmes, UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei said on Thursday.

"They are working on an action plan already," Mr ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), told reporters after meeting US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham.

He said the plan was "to clean up all the highly enriched uranium (HEU) and plutonium that is still in the civilian cycle". This represents 100 facilities in 40 countries, Mr ElBaradei said.

Highly enriched uranium can be used to make an atom bomb but also as fuel in civilian research reactors. Department of Energy officials had no comment on the plan.

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And on a related note:

Washington plans reaction to nuclear strike

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/19/1079199430915.html

To cope with the possibility that terrorists might some day detonate a nuclear bomb on US soil, the Government is reviving a scientific art that was lost after the Cold War: fallout analysis.

The goal, officials and weapons experts say, is to figure out quickly who exploded such a bomb and where the nuclear material came from. That would clarify the options for striking back. Officials also hope that if terrorists know a bomb can be traced, they will be less likely to try to use one.

In a secretive effort that began five years ago but whose outlines are just now becoming known, the Government's network of weapons laboratories is hiring new experts, calling in old-timers, dusting off data and holding drills to sharpen its ability to do what is euphemistically known as nuclear attribution or post-event forensics.

It is also building robots that would go into a destruction zone and take radioactive samples, as well as field stations that would dilute dangerous material for safe shipment to national laboratories.

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