uranium

Uranium shipped to Montreal from Iraq in top secret mission

Last Updated: Saturday, July 5, 2008 | 7:27 PM ET
The Associated Press

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2008/07/05/saddam-uranium.html

The last major remnant of Saddam Hussein's nuclear program, a huge stockpile of concentrated natural uranium, reached Montreal on Saturday to complete a top-secret U.S. operation.

The removal of 550 metric tonnes of "yellowcake," the seed material for higher-grade nuclear enrichment, included a two-week airlift from Baghdad and a voyage across two oceans.

The Iraqi government sold the yellowcake to a Canadian uranium producer, Cameco Corp., in a transaction the official described as worth "tens of millions of dollars."

A Cameco spokesman, Lyle Krahn, said the yellowcake will be processed at facilities in Ontario for use in energy-producing reactors.

"We are pleased … that we have taken (the yellowcake) from a volatile region into a stable area to produce clean electricity," Krahn said.

U.S. and Iraqi forces have guarded the 9,300-hectare yellowcake site since its discovery.

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