Thai authorities, acting on a tip-off from US customs agents, on Friday arrested a Thai citizen with 30kg of highly radioactive material that could potentially be used by terrorists to make a “dirty bomb.” The 47-year-old man was arrested in a sting operation at the car park of a Bangkok hotel while handing over a container of what he said was uranium to undercover officers – who had posed as buyers willing to pay Bt10m ($240,000, ?205,000, £144,000) for the material. Laboratory tests subsequently determined it was caesium-137, a radioactive isotope that has legitimate industrial and medical uses but could also be used in a dirty bomb. The International Atomic Energy Agency is running a campaign to warn the world’s governments of the dangers of terrorists making a dirty bomb or radiological weapon, which disperses radioactive material such as caesium-137 through a conventional explosion. This is easier than producing a nuclear bomb from uranium or plutonium. Full Story
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