Mexico Official: Stolen Radioactive Material Found
from AP 4 Dec 2013
*UPDATE* Mexico
official: Stolen cobalt-60 found; says no risk so far to surrounding
population.
Mexico's nuclear
safety director says a stolen container of radioactive material has been found
empty.
Juan Eibenschutz says
radioactivity has been detected about 1 kilometer (a half mile) from where the
stolen truck and empty container were found in the state of Mexico.
He says authorities have cordoned
off the area.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE.
Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
A cargo truck hauling extremely
dangerous radioactive material from used medical equipment was stolen from a
gas station in Mexico,
and authorities put out an alert in six central states and the capital to find
it, Mexican officials said Wednesday.
The truck was carrying a metal
container of cobalt-60 headed to a nuclear waste facility in the state of
Mexico, said Juan Eibenschutz, director general of the National Commission of
Nuclear Safety and Safeguards.
Though the container is heavily
sealed in lead and designed to be difficult to break into and to survive
accidents intact, it contains an amount of radioactive material that could do
serious damage if opened, Eibenschutz said. Direct exposure would result in
death within a few minutes, he said.
"This is a radioactive source
that is very strong," Eibenschutz told The Associated Press, adding that
it can be almost immediately fatal, depending on proximity. "The intensity
is very big if it is broken."
Eibenschutz didn't know the exact
weight, but said it was the largest amount stolen in recent memory, and the
intensity of the material caused the alert. Local, state and federal
authorities, including the military, were searching for the truck.
The material was used in obsolete
radiation therapy equipment that is being replaced throughout Mexico's public
health system. It was coming from the general hospital in the northern border
city of Tijuana,
Eibenshutz said.
The thieves most likely wanted the
white 2007 Volkswagen cargo vehicle with a moveable platform and crane, he
said.
Eibenschutz said there was nothing
so far to indicate the theft of the cobalt was intentional or in any way
intended for an act of terrorism.
The thieves likely didn't know
what the truck was carrying, and might have discarded the metal container,
which is about a meter square, he said.
"If someone finds a big chunk
of metal with radiation symbols all over it, they should notify us immediately
and don't open it," Eibenschutz said.
The truck marked "Transportes
Ortiz" left Tijuana on Nov. 28 and was
headed to the storage facility when the driver stopped to rest at a gas station
in Tepojaco, in Hidalgo state north of Mexico City.
The driver, Valentin Escamilla
Ortiz, told authorities he was sleeping in the truck when two men with a gun
approached about 1:30 a.m. Tuesday. They made him get out, tied his hands and
feet and left him in a vacant lot nearby.
When he was able to free himself,
he ran back to the gas station to get help.
The truck has a GPS locator but it
wasn't active at the time of the theft, Eibenschutz said.
Mexican customs officials were on
alert to prevent the truck from crossing the border, Eibenschutz said. He said
the material could not be used to make a nuclear bomb, but could be used in a
dirty bomb, a conventional explosive that disseminates radioactive material.
All of the U.S. ports of
entry have radiation detectors in place and trucks crossing the border are
routinely screened for radiation.
On average, a half dozen thefts of
radioactive materials are reported in Mexico each year and none have
proven to be aimed at the cargo, Eibenschutz said. He said that in all the
cases the thieves were after shipping containers or the vehicles.
Unintentional thefts of
radioactive materials are not uncommon, said an official familiar with cases
reported by International Atomic Energy Agency member states, who was not
authorized to comment on the case. In some cases, radioactive sources have
ended up being sold as scrap, causing serious harm to people who unknowingly
come into contact with it.
In a Mexican case in the 1970s,
one thief died and the other was injured when they opened a container holding
radioactive material, he said.
The container was junked and sold
to a foundry, where it contaminated some steel reinforcement bars made there.
Eibenschutz said all foundries in Mexico now have equipment to detect
radioactive material.
Mexico
& Nuclear
Ernesto
Zedillo was the president of Mexico,
a board member for the International
Crisis Group, and a commissioner for the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
Note: Gareth Evans is a
board member for the International
Crisis Group, and was a co-chair for the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
George
Soros is a board member for the International
Crisis Group, the chairman for the Foundation
to Promote Open Society, and the founder & chairman Open Society Foundations.
Foundation
to Promote Open Society was a funder for the Brookings Institution (think tank), and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (think tank).
Open
Society Foundations was a funder for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (think tank), and the Atlantic Council of the United States
(think tank).
Jessica Tuchman Mathews was an honorary
trustee at the Brookings Institution (think tank), is a board member for
the International Crisis Group, a
director at the American Friends of Bilderberg (think tank), the
president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (think tank),
a director at the Nuclear Threat
Initiative (think tank), and a 2008 Bilderberg conference
participant (think tank).
Ed Griffin’s interview with
Norman Dodd in 1982
(The investigation into the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace uncovered the plans for population
control by involving the United
States in war)
Chas. W. Freeman
Jr. is a director at the Atlantic
Council of the United States
(think tank), a trustee at the Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace (think tank), was the National
Intelligence Council chairman nominee for the Barack Obama administration, and a U.S.
ambassador for Saudi Arabia.
Turki bin Faisal
was the intelligence chief for Saudi Arabia,
and a commissioner for the International
Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace (think
tank) was a funder for the Nuclear
Threat Initiative (think tank).
Shirley Williams
is a director at the Nuclear Threat
Initiative (think tank), and was a commissioner for the International Commission on Nuclear
Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
William
J. Perry was a commissioner for the International
Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, is a director at
the Nuclear Threat Initiative (think
tank), and a director at the Atlantic
Council of the United States
(think tank).
Better World
Fund was a funder for the Atlantic
Council of the United States
(think tank).
Gro Harlem
Brundtland is a director at the Better
World Fund, and was a commissioner for the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
Ted
Turner is the founder & chairman for the Better World Fund, the founder of CNN, and a co-chairman for the Nuclear
Threat Initiative (think tank).
Igor
S. Ivanov is a director at the Nuclear
Threat Initiative (think tank), and a board member for the International Crisis Group.
Ernesto
Zedillo was a board member for the International
Crisis Group, a commissioner for the International
Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, and the president
of Mexico.
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