STOCKHOLM: Israel may have enough nuclear material to make almost 100 nuclear bombs; India could make as many as 60 bombs and its archrival Pakistan up to 10, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRD) said on Monday.
North Korea could accumulate enough plutonium for four to seven nuclear weapons by the end of 1995, SIPRI said.
None of these countries have confirmed they have a nuclear weapons’ program, though Pakistan and India admit the potential to make weapons.
The estimates were included in what SIPRI said was the first comprehensive study of the quantities and whereabouts of weapon grade plutonium and uranium produced since the discovery of nuclear power 50 years ago,
The report said, there was a total of about 1,000 metric tons of plutonium and 1,300 tons of highly enriched uranium in the world. A few kilograms of either substance can be used to make a nuclear device.
Controlling and disposing these vast quantities is one of the most serious challenges facing the international community,” SIPRI said.
Most of the world’s stocks are in the hands of the major nuclear powers the United States, the former Soviet Union, Britain, France and China.
But civilian nuclear power plants, which generate plutonium as a byproduct, can be used as a platform for nuclear weapon programs in other countries, another serious threat of nuclear proliferation follows possible lack of control of nuclear weapons in the crumbling Soviet empire, which has the world’s biggest arsenal, SIPRI said. The 246page report estimated, 720 tons of weapon grade uranium stored in the former Soviet Union, mostly in war heads due to be dismantled in line with the STARTI, START Il, and INF treaties, The United States had signed an agreement with Russia in February to buy 500 tons of the enriched uranium, to help ensure the stocks do not fall in wrong hands.
SIPRI said, some countries appeared to be backing away from former nuclear ambitions, including Argentina, Brazil, South Africa and Taiwan, Iraq could have had its first nuclear bomb next year, had it not been for the Gulf war, it said. Iran and North Korea remained high on the list of countries suspected of attempting to construct nuclear weapons, the report said. SIPRI said about 20% of the world stocks of plutonium was held by countries outside the five nuclear weapon states, Most of it was in the form of spent nuclear waste from civilian power production, Separating such plutonium for use in nuclear weapons requires sophisticated technology and knowhow, The slashing of the superpowers’ nuclear weapon arsenals is creating a huge excess of highly enriched uranium and weapon grade plutonium. As a result production of weapon grade uranium has virtually ceased, SIPRT said, but civilian nuclear power production continues to chum out new plutonium. “It seems likely that the production of weapon grade plutonium is reaching an upper limit, even though three military production reactors still operated in Russia till early 1993,” the report said. The report stressed the need to end the oversupply of civilian plutonium, much of it will have to be treated as waste, while highly enriched uranium can be diluted and used as nuclear fuel. It also called for greater
Transparency surrounding these materials and said the U.N. should publish annual statistics on every country’s holdings.
“Although of vital interest for international security there are uncertainties over the quantities and whereabouts of the nuclear materials, it said. The report has been written by researchers David Albright, Frans Berkhout and William Walker. Information came from both published and anonymous sources, mainly interviews with officials.
Article extracted from this publication >> March 5, 1993
