Center Prepares for Nuclear Summit

In preparation for next year’s Nuclear Security Summit in the Netherlands, the Project on Managing the Atom (MTA) is rolling out a series of reports on strengthening international efforts to secure nuclear material around the world. Matthew Bunn and William Tobey, along with other staff and fellows at the Belfer Center, have also begun briefing officials from key states attending the summit on priority steps for reducing nuclear security risks.

In August, MTA released the report “Plutonium Mountain: Inside the 17-Year Mission to Secure a Legacy of Soviet Nuclear Testing,” described in detail on page 5 in this newsletter. The authors, Eben Harrell and David Hoffman, tell how scientists and engineers in three countries managed to secure a significant amount of weapons-grade plutonium in Kazakhstan.

In October, eight experts from MTA, the Belfer Center’s International Security Program, and the Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies collaborated to release “Steps to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism: Recommendations Based on the U.S.-Russia Joint Threat Assessment.” This report, featured on the following page, analyzes the existing framework for preventing nuclear terrorism, cites gaps and deficiencies, and makes recommendations for improvement.

In the coming months, MTA will release two additional reports of relevance to the upcoming summit. The first will report the results of a survey in which MTA asked security experts in key countries to describe the security practices they employ and the factors that have caused them to change what they do. Early in 2014, MTA will release a report that assesses progress toward securing all highly enriched uranium and plutonium around the world to the highest practicable standard, identifies the most urgent remaining gaps, and recommends measures for filling those gaps.

MTA and Belfer Center personnel will discuss their ideas with diplomatic delegations attending the summit and will also participate in the international NGO-based Nuclear Knowledge Summit in Amsterdam, in parallel to the Nuclear Security Summit (NSS).