Rockets Said to Be Missing in Moldova
Dozens of rockets outfitted with so-called dirty bombs -- warheads designed to scatter deadly radioactive material -- appear to be missing in a breakaway region of Moldova, an expert said Monday.
Oazu Nantoi, a political analyst who works at the nongovernmental Institute for Policy Studies here in the capital, said he had seen photocopies of Russian military documents showing that the dirty bomb warheads -- 24 ready to use, 14 dismantled -- were missing from a depot near Trans-Dniester Tiraspol military airport.
Nantoi is an expert on Trans-Dniester, which has been policed by thousands of Russian troops since its fight for independence from Moldova in the early 1990s. The possibility the warheads were missing was first published Sunday in the Washington Post.
Nantoi said the documents came from a disgruntled Russian military official who said he had not received compensation for being exposed to radioactive material.
Moldova is a former Soviet republic, and thousands of tons of weapons remained stored in Trans-Dniester after the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Nantoi said reports first reached him in 1998 that Alazan rockets had been fitted with warheads modified to carry radioactive material.
Since then, the rockets and warheads appeared to have disappeared from storage, he said.
The possibility of terrorists acquiring dirty bombs is a main concern of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
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