The US and its partners have removed all remaining highly enriched uranium from an old research reactor in Venezuela, the US Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) announced, reports Anadolu.

“The safe removal of all enriched uranium from Venezuela sends another signal to the world of a restored and renewed Venezuela,” said NNSA Administrator Brandon Williams.

The operation involved removing 13.5 kilograms of uranium from the RV-1 reactor in Caracas, which had previously been used for physics and nuclear energy research.

The material, enriched above the 20 percent threshold that defines highly enriched uranium, had become redundant after the reactor’s research activities ended in 1991, it said.

According to the NNSA, preparations for the assessment of the facility included personnel from the US State Department, experts from the UK, the Venezuelan Ministry of Science and Technology and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The IAEA confirmed in a statement that the uranium had been “transported safely and securely by land and sea from South America to North America” after what it described as “a complex and sensitive operation”.

According to the IAEA, uranium, “in the form of nuclear fuel enriched to just over 20 percent of the fissile isotope uranium-235,” was transferred from a decommissioned research reactor at the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research (IVIC), about 15 kilometers southwest of Caracas, to the US Department of Energy’s Savannah River facility in South Carolina.

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Source: prizrenpost