JULY 18, 2006 : (UN REPORT SAYS THERE IS "NO DOUBT" A SHIPMENT OF SMUGGLED URANIUM 238 DISCOVERED BY CUSTOMS OFFICIALS IN TANZANIA WAS FROM THE LUBUMBASHI MINES IN CONGO - SHIPMENT WAS DESTINED FOR IRAN'S PORT OF BANDAR ABBAS) IRAN is seeking to import large consignments of bomb-making uranium from the African mining area that produced the Hiroshima bomb, an investigation has revealed.
A United Nations report, dated July 18, said there was “no doubt” that a huge shipment of smuggled uranium 238, uncovered by customs officials in Tanzania, was transported from the Lubumbashi mines in the Congo.
Tanzanian customs officials told The Sunday Times it was destined for the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas, and was stopped on October 22 last year during a routine check. The disclosure will heighten western fears about the extent of Iran’s presumed nuclear weapons programme and the strategic implications of Iran’s continuing support for Hezbollah during the war with Israel. ....
....The report by the UN investigation team was submitted to the chairman of the UN sanctions committee, Oswaldo de Rivero, at the end of July and will be considered soon by the security council. It states that Tanzania provided “limited data” on three other shipments of radioactive materials seized in Dar es Salaam over the past 10 years.
....The experts said: “In reference to the last shipment from October 2005, the Tanzanian government left no doubt that the uranium was transported from Lubumbashi by road through Zambia to the united republic of Tanzania.” Lubumbashi is the capital of mineral-rich Katanga province, home of the Shinkolobwe uranium mine that produced material for the two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.
The mine has officially been closed since 1961, before the country’s independence from Belgium, but the UN investigators have told the security council that they found evidence of illegal mining still going on at the site.
----------- "Iran's plot to mine uranium in Africa," Jon Swain, David Leppard and Brian Johnson-Thomas, The Sunday Times (U.K.), 08/06/06, Posted on 08/05/2006 4:42:49 PM PDT by Pokey78