THE HARD CASES

Abstract

Many countries received Soviet-origin highly enriched uranium (HEU) for civilian nuclear research purposes. Because of inadequate nuclear security at a number of the research sites, U.S. policy has sought to remove or otherwise safely dispose of their HEU stocks as quickly as possible. Although the pace of HEU disposition has accelerated significantly in recent years, several sites have posed formidable technical, economic, and political challenges. This article identifies the major obstacles to HEU removal at two key installations—Kharkiv in Ukraine, and Sosny in Belarus—and recommends a strategy for overcoming these impediments. Key components for a successful disposition strategy include: treating these cases with the urgency they deserve, expanding potential compensation packages, explicitly addressing the institutional and political issues involved, engaging high-level political leaders, working with third parties, and promoting these efforts as part of a nondiscriminatory initiative to phase out HEU in the civilian nuclear sector globally.

Keywords:

• Highly enriched uranium
• Ukraine
• Belarus
• proliferation
• civilian nuclear sector

Acknowledgements

Scott Parrish assisted in the research and writing of this article. This study was prepared with support from the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Ploughshares Fund. The views expressed, however, are solely those of the authors.

Notes

1. For an analysis of different nuclear threats, see Charles D. Ferguson and William C. Potter (with Amy Sands, Leonard S. Spector, and Fred L. Wehling), The Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism (New York: Routledge, 2005).

2. See David Albright, “Global Stocks of Nuclear Explosive Materials: Summary Tables and Charts,” Institute for Science and International Security, July 12, 2005, revised September 7, 2005, <www.isis-online.org/global_stocks/end2003/summary_global_stocks.pdf>.

3. A number of important initiatives also have been undertaken to secure and reduce stocks of HEU in the military sector, including the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and the “Megatons to Megawatts” HEU Purchase Agreement.

4. For a discussion of the successes and limitations of the RERTR program, see Robert Civiak, Closing the Gaps: Securing Highly-Enriched Uranium in the Former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (Washington, DC: Federation of American Scientists, 2002). See also Philipp C. Bleek, “Global Cleanout of Civil Nuclear Material: Toward a Comprehensive, Threat-Driven Response,” SGP Issue Brief, No. 4, September 2005, p. 4. The Materials Consolidation and Conversion program is discussed in Cristina Chuen, “Reducing the Risk of Nuclear Terrorism: Decreasing the Availability of HEU,” CNS research story, May 6, 2005. For analyses of the various HEU removal and repatriation efforts involving Soviet-origin HEU prior to 2004, see William C. Potter, “Project Saphire: U.S.-Kazakhstan Cooperation for Nonproliferation,” in John M. Shields and William C. Potter, eds., Dismantling the Cold War: U.S. and NIS Perspectives on the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), 1997, pp. 345–362; and Philipp C. Bleek, “Global Cleanout: An Emerging Approach to the Civil Nuclear Material Threat,” Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Managing the Atom, Harvard University, September 2004.

5. DOE, “Department of Energy Launches New Global Threat Reduction Initiative,” press release, May 26, 2004.

6. DOE has not formally altered the target dates, although they have not been fully met. As discussed below, the three notable exceptions with respect to fresh fuel are Vietnam (completed in 2007), Belarus (still unmet), and Ukraine (still unmet). The target dates for spent fuel remain intact, although DOE currently distinguishes between fuel stored outside of reactors (2010 target) and fuel remaining in reactors (2014). DOE official, interview with CNS staff, February 7, 2008. This interviewee and most others cited below were granted anonymity due to the sensitivity of the subjects discussed.

7. See Alexander Glaser and Frank N. von Hippel, “Global Cleanout: Reducing the Threat of HEU-Fueled Nuclear Terrorism,” Arms Control Today 36 (January/February 2006).

8. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), “GTRI: More Than Three Years of Reducing Nuclear Threats,” fact sheet, September 2007; NNSA, “All Highly Enriched Uranium Removed from Latvia,” press release, May 16, 2008.

9. See “Combating the Risk of Terrorism by Reducing the Civilian Use of Highly Enriched Uranium,” Working Paper submitted to the 2005 Review Conference of States Parties to the NPT by Iceland, Lithuania, Norway, and Sweden, NPT/CONF.2005/MC.III/WP.5, May 2005.

10. See IAEA, “Management of High Enriched Uranium for Peaceful Uses: Status and Trends,” IAEA TECDOC-1452, June 2005.

11. For a discussion of these bureaucratic battles, see Potter, “Project Sapphire.”

12. See “Georgia: Operation Auburn Endeavor,” CNS Nuclear Profiles Database, <www.nti.org/db/nisprofs/georgia/auburn.htm>.

13. See NTI, “NTI Commits $5 Million to Help Secure Vulnerable Nuclear Weapons Material,” press release, August 23, 2002; Philipp Bleek, “Project Vinca: Lessons for Securing Civilian Nuclear Material Stockpiles,” Nonproliferation Review 10 (Fall/Winter 2003), pp. 1–23. See also William C. Potter et al., “Tito's Nuclear Legacy,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, March/April 2002, pp. 63–70.

14. Bleek, “Global Cleanout: An Emerging Approach,” p. 22.

15. Bleek, “Global Cleanout: An Emerging Approach,” p. 22.

16. In recognition that early disposition of the HEU at Sosny and Kharkiv was unlikely, DOE has undertaken significant programs to implement physical protection upgrades at both sites.

17. See Jon Wolfsthal, Cristina Chuen, and Emily Ewell Daughtry, Nuclear Status Report: Nuclear Weapons, Fissile Material, and Export Controls in the Former Soviet Union (Monterey, CA: Monterey Institute of International Studies, June 2001), p. 169. Another report based on a trip to Kharkiv in 2002 suggests that in addition to weapon-grade HEU, the Kharkiv Institute may retain 30–40 kg of HEU as “scrap” at enrichment levels of 20, 25, and 36 percent. Source from 2002 has requested anonymity.

18. Ukrainian officials, personal interview with CNS staff, January 5 and 10, 2005. Ukrainian officials sometimes make the distinction between HEU reactor fuel at Kyiv and Sevastopol, which they regard as negotiable under GTRI, and the “bulk HEU” at Kharkiv, which is not reactor fuel.

19. See Wolfsthal, Chuen, and Daughtry, Nuclear Status Report, p. 158; and A. Mikhalevich, A. Iakouskev, A. Batalov, and Yuriy Sivakov, “Ensuring Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials in Belarus,” Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies, June 1995.

20. Senior IAEA official, personal interview with CNS staff, Vienna, February 6, 2004.

21. DOE personnel, interview with CNS staff, January 2008.

22. See Potter, “Project Sapphire,” and Bleek, “Global Cleanout: An Emerging Approach.”

23. See Bleek, “Global Cleanout: An Emerging Approach,” p. 24 on this point. Vice President Al Gore was personally engaged in Project Sapphire.

24. On this point see Bleek, “Global Cleanout: An Emerging Approach,” p. 25.

25. KIPT officials, interviews with CNS staff March 11, 2005.

26. U.S. “non-paper” on HEU repatriation in Ukraine, 2005; DOE officials, interviews with CNS staff member, March–July 2005.

27. Critical assemblies can be used to mock up power reactors and perform various experiments, among other applications.

28. One concern expressed by KIPT staff is that current Ukrainian regulations require a critical assembly to be built several kilometers away from the nearest inhabited area, effectively ruling out such an assembly at KIPT. KIPT interviews with CNS staff, March 11, 2005.

29. See Cristina Chuen, “Russian Nuclear Exports to Iran: U.S. Policy Change Needed,” March 27, 2003.

30. Kharkiv Institute official, interviews with CNS staff, Kharkiv, Ukraine, 2005; Ukrainian Foreign Ministry official, interview with CNS staff, New York, May 24, 2005. Washington is not the only target of such criticism. Several Ukrainian government officials expressed similar resentment about the nuclear safety assistance Ukraine has received from European countries following the Chernobyl accident. Members and staff of the Verkhovna Rada and officials of the Ministry of Fuel and Energy, interviews with CNS staff, March 13 and 16, 2005.

31. In this connection, one Ukrainian Foreign Ministry official indicated that a possible precedent for this kind of an arrangement was a deal worked out to overcome Ministry of Defense resistance in 1999–2000 to the return of strategic bombers to Russia. The package included the reduction of a huge debt incurred by Ukraine for purchases of natural gas and oil from Russia and Turkmenistan. Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs official, interview with the authors, January 10, 2005. See also “Ukraine Profile: Nuclear Weapons,” entries for August 1999 and February 2000, <www.nti.org/e_research/profiles/Ukraine/Nuclear/3969_4933.html>.

32. Illustrative of this sentiment is the article by Vladimir Kravchenko, “An ‘Enriched’ Partnership,” Zerkalo Nedeli, March 19–25, 2005.

33. Senior Ukrainian Foreign Ministry official, interview with CNS staff, New York, May 5, 2005. The U.S. Congress has since revoked Jackson-Vanik for Ukraine.

34. Senior Ukrainian Foreign Ministry official interview with CNS staff, New York, May 24, 2005.

35. Ukrainian official, interview with CNS staff, Vienna, October 2005.

36. Ukrainian officials, interviews with CNS staff, January 5, 2005 and January 10, 2005.

37. Ukrainian official, interview with CNS staff, Vienna, October 2005.

38. Ukrainian official, interview with CNS staff, Vienna, October 2005.

39. Ukrainian official, interview with CNS staff, Kyiv, October 2007.

40. IAEA and Ukrainian officials, interviews with CNS staff, Vienna, September 2, 2004, and September 27, 2005.

41. Ukrainian officials and U.S. officials, interviews with CNS staff, in Vienna and Washington, DC, October and November 2005, and in Washington and Kyiv in October 2007. The DOE and State Department were optimistic in June 2004 that an agreement for the removal of HEU at Kyiv and Sevastopol would be achieved, but it took several more years to work out an accord, and, as of the spring of 2008, some of the details remain to be settled. Ukrainian officials indicated that there is now a consensus that the spent fuel at the two institutes should be moved but some disagreement about where it should go: some wanted to transfer the fuel to Kharkiv for storage (thus deferring decisions as to its final disposition), while others thought it should be sent directly back to Russia. The disposition of the fresh fuel remains to be agreed; final decisions will clearly require high-level political approval.

42. Ukrainian official, interviews with CNS staff, January 5 and 10, 2005; interviews with CNS staff, in Kyiv and Washington, 2007.

43. NTI, “Government of Kazakhstan and NTI Mark Success of HEU Blend-Down Project; Material Could Have Been Used to Make Up To Two Dozen Nuclear Bombs,” press release, October 8, 2005.

44. Interviews in Kyiv, October 2007.

45. See William C. Potter, The Politics of Nuclear Renunciation: The Cases of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine (Washington, DC: The Stimson Center, 1995); and “Nuclear Move: Pros and Cons,” Zerkalo Nedeli, November 22–28, 2003.

46. Another approach to reducing stocks of HEU at Kharkiv proposed by one senior KIPT scientist was to sell the HEU as “calibration samples” to the United States and the IAEA. CNS experts are unable to assess the technical merits of this proposal. KIPT scientist, interviews with CNS staff, Kharkiv, March 11, 2005.

47. The 170 kg figure refers to the weight of the U-235. Some sources cite 370 kg of HEU, but this amount appears to refer to the total weight of the uranium. See A. Mikhaelivich et al., “Ensuring Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials in Belarus.”

48. See K. Murakami et al., “IAEA Safeguards and Verification of the Initial Inventory Declarations in the NIS,” July 1997, p. 3, distributed at a workshop on “A Comparative Analysis of Approaches to the Protection of Fissile Materials,” Stanford University, June 28–30, 1997; William C. Potter, Nuclear Profiles of the Soviet Successor States, Monograph No. 1 (Monterey, CA: Monterey Institute of International Studies, 1993), pp. 6–7; and NTI, “Country Overviews: Belarus: Nuclear Facilities,” <www.nti.org/e_research/profiles/Belarus/5459_5434.html>.

49. IAEA staff, interviews with CNS staff, Vienna, September 21, 2004.

50. See H. Kiyavitskaya et al., “Experimental Investigations at Sub-Critical Facilities of Joint Institute for Power and Nuclear Research–Sosny of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus,” 2005.

51. An interview by a CNS staff member with a Belarusian official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of Humanitarian, Ecological, and Scientific-Technical Cooperation indicated that one such project for which funds were sought from the International Science and Technology Center involved “Transmutation of Long-Living Radioactive Materials,” Minsk, March 10, 2005. The 2005 paper by Kiyavitskaya et al. reports that Belarusian and U.S. specialists will undertake a multi-year research project to explore the feasibility of converting the HEU core of the subcritical assembly at Sosny to LEU.

52. Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials, personal interviews with one of the authors, New York, May 11, 2005.

53. The Belarusian intelligence service reportedly did not take kindly to this exercise. CNS staff interview with DOE official, November 10, 2005.

54. Belarusian Foreign Ministry official, interview with CNS staff, May 11, 2005.

55. IAEA, interview with CNS staff, February 6, 2004.

56. The Belarus Democracy Reauthorization Act of 2006 bans U.S. government financial assistance to Belarus, except for humanitarian aid, until Minsk investigates the disappearances of Lukashenko opponents, releases political prisoners, and relaxes pressure on independent media and pro-democracy organizations.

57. U.S. expert, interview with CNS staff, Washington, DC, August 22, 2003.

58. IAEA officials, interview with CNS staff, February 6, 2004.

59. U.S. government officials, interviews with CNS staff , March and April 2005.

60. U.S. government officials, interview with CNS staff, Washington, DC, May 20, 2005.

61. DOE officials, interviews with CNS staff, October and December 2007, and January 2008.

62. Belarusian Foreign Ministry official, interview with CNS staff, Minsk, March 10, 2005.

63. Senior Swedish parliamentarian, interview with CNS staff, Bratislava, May 30, 2004.

64. Latypov allegedly was removed as part of a move by Lukashenko to purge senior members of his government who were seen as having particularly close ties with Moscow. See “Belarus Leader Sacks Aide with Close Moscow Ties,” Reuters, November 30, 2004.

65. Ural Latypov, personal interviews with CNS staff prior to his assumption of senior posts in the Lukashenko government. Latypov participated for several years in nonproliferation meetings organized in Monterey and Minsk by CNS.

66. Senior Swedish parliamentarian, discussions with CNS staff, December 11 and 20, 2005. The Belarusian scientist appears to have been Academician A. Mikhalevich, formerly the director of IEP.

67. CNS staff repeatedly has encouraged senior officials at State and DOE to take advantage of Sweden's good offices with respect to Belarus, but without noticeable effect to date.

68. DOE reportedly has written at least one classified paper on possible outcomes in the case of Belarus. U.S. government official, interview with CNS staff, Washington, DC, July 11, 2005.

69. U.S. and Swedish officials, interviews with CNS staff, summer 2006 and spring 2007.

70. See Senator Sam Nunn, “Keynote Address,” 2002 Non-Proliferation Conference, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, DC, November 14, 2002, <nti.org/c_press/speech_samnunn_1114.pdf>.