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نذير رضا
Next Monday, Lebanon’s “National Council for Scientific Research” will receive packages containing “high-purity nuclear materials” from the Zahrani oil refinery in southern Lebanon, after the existence of such materials was detected in the oil facility.
Acting Prime Minister Hassan Diab revealed, during his speech at yesterday’s Supreme Defense Council meeting, about a new dossier that “also poses a danger.” This is what the report prepared by the German company COMBILIFT spoke about, and refers to “dangerous chemical substances found in a warehouse at the Zahrani oil facilities.”
Diab said: “After examination by experts from the Lebanese Atomic Energy Authority, it was clear that these materials are high-purity nuclear materials and their presence represents a hazard, according to the report I received from General Security.” “This issue must be discussed now, and there must be a very fast procedure to address it with the greatest care,” he said.
The Supreme Defense Council ordered the Acting Minister of Energy and Water, Raymond Ghajar, to take the necessary measures, in coordination with the relevant ministries and institutions, especially the Lebanese Atomic Energy Authority, to store highly hazardous materials, after removing them from oil facilities. or any other place.
The history of chemicals that include nuclear salts dates back to the 1950s when there was an American company operating the oil refinery in Zahrani in the south, and these materials are used in the work of the refinery, according to the Secretary. General. of the National Council for Scientific Research, Dr. Muin Hamzah, explained in statements by “Al-Sharq al-Awsat”, that “they are not nuclear materials, but chemical materials containing salts of depleted uranium”, highlighting that they are “preserved from a very solid way, and they are in small packages. “
Hamza pointed to a letter that reached the “National Council for Scientific Research” of the Energy Ministry, in accordance with the rules, requesting inspection of these packages after the German company COMBILIFT called attention to their presence. He said: “We send experts before us to inspect them, and we suggest to the Ministry of Energy two possibilities, the first of which is to help them package them safely, or transport them to our centers because they are materials with a very high laboratory value and the we need. “It’s depleted uranium.”
The General Directorate of Petroleum sent a letter on March 24 to the National Council for Scientific Research and the Lebanese Atomic Energy Commission about the presence of radioactive materials at the Zahrani oil facilities. The management says in the book that “Asharq Al-Awsat” obtained a copy of, that he has read “the report of the expert assigned by you to detect radioactive materials and determine the extent of its danger and the procedures necessary to lift and transport out of the facilities. ”The management informs the National Council for Scientific Research in the book that it is impossible to store these materials in oil facilities, requesting the Lebanese Atomic Energy Commission to transfer them to their laboratories, based on their offer; under supervisory control and approve the approved principles and standards related to these materials. “
Hamzah told Asharq Al-Awsat: “We decided and informed the Supreme Defense Council that we will transfer these materials to our centers, and we will consider them a valuable scientific gift that we will use within the agency’s laboratories, and we will duly report them to the Agency. Atomic Energy International “. Hamzah asked not to be afraid of their presence, saying that chemical materials are present in universities and scientific laboratories, and each case is treated according to the rules, and does not represent a risk. The International Atomic Energy Agency, and we will have protection and security.
In turn, the director of oil facilities in Zahrani, Ziyad Al-Zein, said that while a comprehensive inventory was being carried out at the facilities, “8 drugs were documented whose weight does not exceed two kilograms that contain chemicals, so the Directorate of Facilities asked the German company that works in the repackaging of radioactive materials in the port of Beirut to inspect them, “explaining in a television interview that they are” scientific research materials; It was introduced in the 1950s, when the facility was managed by the American company Medrico, when the facility had an oil refinery and before the issuance of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons ”.
The director of the National Atomic Energy Authority, Bilal Nsouli, explained that “depleted uranium salts are consumable materials used in scientific research”, highlighting that they are “neither explosive nor flammable.” In an explanation describing it as “high purity,” he said, “we mean that it is of good quality, that is, it can be invested in research, and we do not mean that it is dangerous or anything like that.”
This file is added to the file of radioactive waste and toxic materials in ruinous containers in the port of Beirut, and Diab referred to it in his intervention within the Supreme Defense Council, indicating that the containers should begin their deportation within a few days, after the The ship that will send those containers left Lebanon, he pointed out, noting that “there is still the archive of new containers that are released in various regions.” He added: “Regarding the radioactive energy waste file, and pending the construction of the building that the Supreme Defense Council had recommended to build in the Eastern Chain, we are working to move this waste out of Lebanon, with the containers in the Port of Beirut “
