Uranium seized near Iraq

ANKARA - Two men carrying a box of uranium have been arrested in Turkey, about 250km from the Iraqi border.

Police acting on a tip-off stopped a taxi and discovered about 15kg of uranium in a lead container hidden beneath the vehicle's seat.

Authorities said the material was worth $5 million and originated from an east European country.

It was to be taken to Ankara for analysis, police said.

The taxi was travelling in the southern province en route from Urfa to the nearby city of Gazi Antep in the southern province of Sanliurfa, which borders Syria.

Turkish officials said they did not know whether the uranium was refined weapons-grade material or naturally occurring uranium, which would have to be refined before it could be used in a weapon.

They did not believe the material posed a radiation danger.

The Turkish state news agency Anatolian said the men were identified as Salih Yasar and Mehmet Demir. The taxi driver was interviewed and released.

The incident happens as speculation mounts that the United States could launch a military attack on Iraq for its alleged programme of weapons of mass destruction.

US President George W. Bush has accused Baghdad of clandestine efforts to develop a nuclear bomb as the White House works to build international support for an operation to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

Officials at Ankara's Atomic Energy Institute would not confirm they had been notified about the material.

"Our investigation on whether the uranium was destined for a neighbouring country is continuing," a Sanliurfa police official said.

CNN quoted an unnamed American official saying that Washington was in discussions with Turkey over the seizure.

The official said such material "isn't exactly easy to come by" and added: "There are a lot of unscrupulous people out there who claim to be selling fissile material and weapons-grade material who turn out to be frauds. That is why, until we know more, I would be more sceptical than anything else. But we are hurrying to learn as much as we can."

The atomic bomb used on Hiroshima in 1945 contained about 25kg of weapons-grade uranium.

The seizure is the biggest of its kind in recent years.

Police in Istanbul seized more than 1kg of weapons-grade uranium last November that had been smuggled into Turkey from an east European nation. The smugglers were detained after trying to sell the material to undercover police.

Smugglers use Turkey's porous eastern border to import drugs, and hundreds of thousands of migrants each year illegally cross the rugged frontier on their way to more affluent European Union nations.

- REUTERS

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