The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and Kazakhstan signed an agreement on Thursday to locate the first internationally-controlled bank of low-enriched uranium in the ex-Soviet nation to ensure fuel supplies for power stations and prevent nuclear proliferation.
The storage facility, set to become fully operational in 2017, is intended to provide IAEA member states with confidence in a steady and predictable supply of fuel even if other routes are disrupted.
Advocates also see it as a way to dissuade countries from building enrichment facilities that might be misused to purify uranium to weapons-grade levels – an issue that bedevilled relations between Iran and the West for more than a decade.
The agreement on establishing the bank was signed by Yukiya Amano, director general of the UN nuclear watchdog, and Kazakh Foreign Minister Erlan Idrissov. The bank will be governed by Kazakhstan’s laws but fully managed and operated by the IAEA.
“This IAEA fuel bank will enable and encourage peaceful uses of nuclear energy, while reducing the risks of proliferation and reducing the risks of catastrophic terrorism,” former US Senator Sam Nunn said in a speech after the signing in the Kazakh capital Astana.
