News and Upcoming Events

U.S.-Ukraine Nonproliferation Working Group Meeting – At the semiannual meeting in Kiev on July 31 and August 1, NSOI Coordinator Michael Stafford and his Ukrainian counterpart reviewed Ukrainian progress in implementing the U.S.-Ukrainian Joint Action Plan and U.S. progress in securing funding for assistance projects supporting that plan. 

Republic of Armenia Signs Joint Action Plan – On July 14, 2008, the Republic of Armenia became the fifth country with which NSOI completed an action plan when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian signed the “Joint Action Plan between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the Republic of Armenia on Combating Smuggling of Nuclear and Radioactive Materials.” For the U.S. Department of State press release on this event, click here.
 
U.S.-EU Coordination Meeting  – Representatives of the U.S. government and the European Union continued consultations in Brussels on June 24-26, 2008 on how EU assistance contributions from the Nuclear Stability Instrument could be coordinated with U.S. assistance efforts.  NSOI Coordinator Michael Stafford proposed as candidates for this EU funding a set of assistance projects that have been developed in NSOI engagements.  
 
Coordination Meeting on Radioactive Source Storage Facility in Ukraine – The Ukrainian Ministry of Emergency Situations hosted a meeting in Kiev on June 17, 2008 to coordinate among potential donors to a project to design, build, and fill a new, long-term storage facility in Ukraine for radioactive sources.  The UK, the U.S., and Ukraine have already committed funding to this effort, and France, Germany, and the EU are also considering providing assistance.  NSOI analyst Brent Eastman attended this session.
 
Fourth Meeting of the Global Initiative to Counter Nuclear Terrorism – The Global Initiative held its fourth plenary session in Madrid, Spain, on June 16-18, 2008.  The session was attended by representatives of approximately 50 Global Initiative member nations.  NSOI Coordinator Michael Stafford gave a presentation at this meeting updating the attendees on NSOI’s progress in engaging at-risk countries and securing funding for assistance projects in those countries.  He thanked those Global Initiative members who have committed to NSOI-developed projects and encouraged others to do so.
 
Joint NSOI-UNODC Legislative Drafting Workshop in Ukraine – NSOI and UNODC's Terrorism Prevention Branch (TPB) held their first joint workshop on legislative drafting in Ukraine from March 11-13, 2008.  This national workshop, entitled the Legislative Drafting Expert Workshop on the Criminal Law Aspects of the Universal Legal Framework Against Nuclear Terrorism, sought to strengthen Ukraine's national legislation and international legal cooperation against nuclear smuggling and terrorism.  UNODC's legal experts, in cooperation with a representative from the U.S. Department of Justice's Counterterrorism Section, developed recommendations for necessary legislative reforms in partnership with a broad delegation of Ukrainian experts.  The goal of these recommendations is to allow Ukrainian law to fully prosecute all cases of nuclear smuggling, including scams, and to identify the necessary steps to bring Ukraine's laws into compliance with the relevant international conventions on terrorism.
 
Kyrgyz Republic Signs Joint Action Plan –On September 30, 2007, the Kyrgyz Republic became the fourth country with which NSOI completed an action plan when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Kyrgyz Foreign Minister Ednan Karabayev signed the “Program of Cooperation between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic on Combating the Smuggling of Nuclear and Radioactive Materials.”   For the U.S. Department of State press release on this event, click here.
 
Global Initiative Technical Workshop on Anti-Nuclear Smuggling Assistance – Twenty countries and three international organizations were represented at this September 5-6, 2007, conference in London that was part of this year’s plan of work for the Global Initiative to Combat WMD Terrorism.  The workshop focused particularly on NSOI-developed assistance projects in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Georgia, the Kyrgyz Republic, and Tajikistan. For details of the conference and its results, click here.
 
Georgia Signs Joint Action Plan – On February 2, 2007, Georgia became the third country with which NSOI completed an action plan when Foreign Minister Gela Bezhuashvili and U.S. Ambassador John Tefft signed the “Joint Document of U.S. and Georgian Delegations on Georgia’s Priority Needs to Improve its Capabilities to Combat Nuclear Smuggling.”  For the Georgian MFA’s press release on this event, click here.
 
UPCOMING EVENTS

 
The Threat of Nuclear Smuggling
The Threat of Nuclear Smuggling
Fissile material -- highly-enriched uranium (HEU) or weapon-grade plutonium -- is the critical ingredient in building a nuclear weapon. Most experts agree that terrorists are not able to produce fissile material, but a reasonably sophisticated terrorist organization could make a crude nuclear weapon, or improvised nuclear device (IND), if it stole or acquired a sufficient quantity and quality of such material. Therefore, combating smuggling of weapons-usable nuclear materials is vital to preventing terrorists from acquiring nuclear weapons.
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