Five detained for attempting to sell uranium worth $ 3mln in Georgia
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Authorities in Georgia have arrested five people for attempting to sell millions of dollars’ worth of uranium, a nuclear material that’s extremely hazardous to human health and life.
At a special briefing this afternoon, Georgia’s State Security Service (SSS) announced five Georgian citizens had been detained. The accused were arrested in an apartment in Kobuleti, a seaside town in western Georgia.
While searching the apartment authorities discovered and seized 1.66kg of solid uranium comprising of two radioactive isotopes – uranium 238 and uranium 235.
The majority of the substance was uranium 238, while the amount of uranium 235 discovered was only 0.23 percent of the entire material.
The seized uranium was worth about three million dollars, said officials.
The SSS did not reveal the identity of the five accused but said the five had been sent to pre-trial detention.
If found guilty of attempting to sell the hazardous substance, the accused face five to 10 years behind bars.
Meanwhile 10 days ago the SSS detained three Georgian and three Armenian citizens for attempting to sell uranium in Georgia’s capital Tbilisi.
The SSS said the alleged offenders planned to sell an amount of uranium (U238) worth $200 million USD when they were caught.
Three Georgian and three Armenian citizens have been arrested for illegally selling nuclear material hazardous to human health in Tbilisi.
Margvelashvili was one of 50 world leaders who participated in the international event held every two years since 2010, with the aim of preventing nuclear terrorism around the globe.
The efforts of Georgian authorities to detect and seize radioactive materials in several cases over the past year has generated high praise from the country’s American and European partners.
State security agencies from Georgia and Belarus have penned a cooperation deal that will see both countries come together to jointly tackle terrorism, corruption, trans-national and international organised crimes.
The Georgian State Security Service has detained two individuals in the Kobuleti region of western Georgia on Tuesday for the illegal possession and sale of radioactive materials.
Tbilisi is hosting a regional conference on nuclear non-proliferation, attended by delegates from the US Department of Energy and International Atomic Energy Agency officials and 10 other foreign countries.