WORLD BRIEFING / UKRAINE
Ukrainian security agents have arrested a regional lawmaker and two companions for allegedly trying to sell a radioactive substance that could be used in making a dirty bomb, officials said.
The legislator in the western Ternopyl region and two local businessmen were detained last week for trying to sell 8.2 pounds of radioactive material to an undercover agent of the security service, said Marina Ostapenko, a spokeswoman for the service.
The suspects tried to peddle the substance as plutonium-239, a highly radioactive material that can be used to build nuclear weapons, and demanded $10 million, Ostapenko said. But security experts later determined the material was probably americium, a widely used radioactive material that could be used in a dirty bomb, not nuclear weapons.
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