Diplomats: Egypt Produced Nuclear Material
NewsMax.com Wires
Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2005
VIENNA, Austria – The U.N. atomic watchdog agency has found evidence of secret nuclear experiments in Egypt that could be used in weapons programs, diplomats said Tuesday.
Egypt has denied in the past that it is trying to develop a nuclear weapons program. It has been known that Egypt had what appeared to be a nuclear research facility, but no public information has ever emerged that the research had developed very far.
The diplomats told The Associated Press that most of the work was carried out in the 1980s and 1990s but said the International Atomic Energy Agency also was looking at evidence suggesting some work was performed as recently as a year ago.
The Egyptians "tried to produce various components of uranium" without declaring it to the IAEA, as they were bound to under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, one of the diplomats said.
The products included several pounds of uranium metal and uranium tetrafluoride, a precursor to uranium hexafluoride gas, the diplomat said on condition of anonymity.
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