U.S. to Buy 500 Tons of Russia’s Leftover Arms Uranium

The United States has agreed to buy all of the highly enriched uranium--roughly 500 tons--to be removed from Russian nuclear weapons marked for destruction under arms reduction treaties, the State Department’s top expert on arms disposal said Wednesday.

William F. Burns, chief of the U.S. organization formed to help Russia dismantle the former Soviet Union’s nuclear arsenal, said further negotiations will be required to fix the price of the uranium.

The U.S. government plans to dilute the material to the low level of enrichment required for civilian nuclear-power reactors.

Burns said that the uranium deliveries from Russia will be stretched out over 20 years to avoid disrupting commercial markets for reactor fuel.

Burns said the agreement is contingent on Russia reaching agreement with Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan, the other three republics where Soviet nuclear arms were based, to share the proceeds “in an appropriate and equitable manner.”