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You are here: Home / Press Room / Center in the News / How safe is depleted uranium and why is the UK’s decision to send it to Ukraine prompting debate?

May 4, 2023

How safe is depleted uranium and why is the UK’s decision to send it to Ukraine prompting debate?

Senior Policy Director John Erath spoke with Euronews about the British decision to send depleted uranium to Ukraine.

“John Erath, a Senior Policy Director at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation told Euronews:

“They’re not considered nuclear weapons. They do not have a nuclear component. And so they are not covered by nuclear non-proliferation treaties. They would be subject to the same export control restrictions as any conventional munition. So, the Russian statement that this is somehow transferring a nuclear capability is completely incorrect.”

But Erath said the Kremlin could still use the supply of these shells to Ukraine as an “excuse” to threaten to use its own nuclear weapons.

“Russia is saying, by using something that a willing mind might connect to nuclear weapons, that increases the chance that we, Russia, would use a nuclear weapon. So this has been a pattern almost since the beginning of the war, where we see these threats that continued support by the West to Ukraine could lead to the use of nuclear weapons. And it’s the West putting the world on that horrible path. So, this is highly irresponsible, but it’s a tactic that the Russian government has used repeatedly.”
…

“Battlefields are going to be contaminated and they’re going to suffer devastating environmental consequences anyway,” said Erath. “What the depleted uranium rounds would add would be minimal. The environmental problems created by a war are so extreme that that should be what people are worried about and not the addition of a few depleted uranium projectiles.” Read more

Posted in: Center in the News, Europe, Press Room, Ukraine, United Kingdom

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