Advertisement

4 Slovaks Seized Trying to Smuggle Box of Uranium

Share
Reuters

Four Slovaks were caught Wednesday trying to smuggle 26.5 ounces of uranium-235 across the border into Hungary, a Slovak Interior Ministry official said Thursday.

The radioactive material was concealed in a lead box in the back seat of a car and was seized in the south-central town of Slovenske Nove Mesto, Jaroslava Ivor, an investigator in the Slovak Interior Ministry, told reporters Thursday.

Three Slovak men and a woman were in the car at the time of the arrest, she said.

Since May, German authorities have made five seizures of radioactive material, much of it believed to originate in the former Soviet Union.

Advertisement

The seizures have prompted fears that criminals are taking advantage of lax security at installations in the former Soviet Union to smuggle out dangerous nuclear material, perhaps for terrorist purposes.

Moscow officially denies that its security is lax and says there is no proof that any of the seized material comes from Russia.

Russia’s Interfax news agency reported early this month that police had arrested thieves in the city of Glazov trying to dispose of 220 pounds of low-grade uranium--the biggest cache of radioactive material reported in the recent spate of smuggling cases.

Advertisement