Much has been written and said about the need for international security for nuclear weapons, nuclear reactors, stockpiles of nuclear materials and nuclear waste. There are international treaties and institutions dedicated to global nuclear security. There are some trouble areas in the world that need special attention to deal with nuclear security. The area south of Poland and north of Greece has seen horrible turbulence in the past few decades. There have been civil wars, NATO interventions, attempted genocides, national breakups and the effects of the disintegration of the Soviet Union to unsettle the area.
I have already written about the fact that Moldova in is a hotbed of smuggling for nuclear materials. National law enforcement and U.S. agents have broken up attempts by terrorists from the Middle East to obtain nuclear materials but there is no way to know if other unknown attempts have been successful.
A great deal of nuclear smuggling has occurred on the Armenian-Georgian border through the unstable and unmonitored areas of South Ossetia which is controlled by separatists. Many Armenians have been caught smuggling nuclear materials suitable for use in building nuclear weapons such as uranium-235 which is highly radioactive and used in making bomb. Other nuclear materials such as cesium have been intercepted which could be used to make dirty bombs.
Armenia shares a border with Iran. Iran has been an international pariah for years because of fears that it is developing nuclear weapons. There have been severe trade sanctions against Iran to prevent it from getting nuclear technologies and nuclear materials. There has been a great deal of truck traffic going from Armenia into Iran for years and there are fears that Iran might have obtained U-235 from foreign sources via that route.
Armenia has been closely allied with Russia since the breakup of the Soviet Union. Armenia looks to Russia for international security. There have been reports that some of the nuclear materials that were smuggled into Armenia via South Ossetia were traced back to Russia nuclear facilities. Russia supplied fuel for the Metsamor nuclear power reactor which is the only nuclear power plant in Armenia. The question is whether or not the Russia government has also sanctioned illegal shipments of nuclear materials to Armenia.
There are reports that Armenia has been working on a clandestine nuclear program. The International Atomic Energy Agency has documented Armenia's illegal acquisition of nuclear materials beginning in 1999. In April of 2016, a former Prime Minister of Armenia announced that Armenia has "nuclear capabilities and the means to further develop them." Armenia has uneasy relations with its neighbors, Turkey and Azerbaijan and may feel that it must have nuclear weapons in order to deter their potential future aggression. Turkey, of course, denies that Armenia needs such weapons but points out that it is more powerful militarily than Armenia which does nothing to dispel Armenian concern.
In addition to concerns about a secret Armenian program to obtain nuclear materials there are also serious international concerns about the safety of the Metsamor nuclear power reactor. The reactor is very old and lacks proper safeguards and safety mechanisms. The area around the Metsamor reactor is very seismically active increasing the danger of an accident.
There are a lot of reasons to be concerned about nuclear security and safety in Armenia. The international community should work to bring pressure on Armenia to deal with these problems.
