Belgrade uranium flown to Russia

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- More than 100 pounds of weapons-grade uranium was flown Thursday from a Belgrade facility vulnerable to terrorist attacks to a more secure facility in Russia, the U.S. State Department said.

The operation was kept secret until Friday because of the need for security, State Department spokesman Philip Reeker told CNN.

"That reactor has been a concern to a lot of people for a while," he said. The United States "didn't want some Albanian radicals getting their hands on it."

The uranium would have been more than enough to make two nuclear bombs, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a private charity that helped arrange the deal.

The State Department paid for Thursday's shipment, which was carried out with great security precautions, officials said.

The material is being stored at the Russian Institute of Atomic Reactors in Dmitrovgrad, the NTI said.

There, U.S. representatives of the Department of Energy's Material Consolidation and Conversion program will ensure it is safely handled, the charity said.

U.S. officials said the deal would never have happened had it not been for the work of NTI, a non-profit organization founded by AOL Time Warner Vice Chairman Ted Turner.

In exchange for allowing the material to be taken from the Vinca Institute of Nuclear Sciences, Yugoslav officials had demanded help cleaning up and stabilizing 2.4 tons of radioactive spent fuel from the Vinca research reactor, said Cathy Gwin, a spokeswoman for the NTI, which describes itself as devoted to reducing the threat of weapons of mass destruction.

In response to the demand, NTI has committed $5 million to stabilize and decommission the reactor. "It was sort of a package deal," Gwin said.

"Stopping terrorists from acquiring nuclear weapons boils down to one top priority: stopping them from getting nuclear bomb-making materials," said Ted Turner, co-chairman of NTI and vice chairman of AOL Time Warner, CNN's parent company.

"Project Vinca is an important step forward in keeping dangerous materials secure and less vulnerable to terrorist theft," Turner said in a statement. "It is also an example of how governments, the private sector and international organizations can work together to find innovative and effective solutions to make the world safer."

NTI had worked with the State Department, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and Yugoslavia over the past year on Project Vinca.

"Project Vinca is a significant global security achievement and a model for action and future cooperation," said former Sen. Sam Nunn, co-chairman of NTI.

NTI does not usually undertake activities that are the responsibility of government. But the U.S. government has no authority to provide assistance for spent fuel management, so the NTI stepped in, the group said.

"I believe that the U.S. Congress must give the administration funding flexibility to deal with collateral matters that are essential to our government's core mission -- providing security for weapons materials," said Nunn. "It is my belief that without NTI's willingness to fill in this gap, the project would not have gone forward."

He added, "All weapons and weapons material on a global basis -- wherever located -- must be accounted for and made secure. This will require a global partnership against catastrophic terrorism."