USA make public its nuclear arsenal after 10 years

US President: Obama opened the plenary session of the Fourth Nuclear Security Summit, which focuses on preventing terrorist groups like the Islamic State to have access to nuclear materials


Washington - US President Barack Obama said on Friday that it will publish the nuclear arsenal of the country for the first time in a decade, as well as a "detailed description" of the security measures that the military take to protegê- it.

Obama opened with this announcement in Washington, the plenary session of the Fourth Nuclear Security Summit, which focuses on preventing terrorist groups like the Islamic State to have access to nuclear materials.

The president celebrated the fact that the risk of nuclear terrorism have declined "measurably", but warned that this threat "persists" and that "the best way to prevent it is to ensure the security of nuclear material."

Faced with representatives from more than 50 countries, Obama announced that 102 nations have ratified the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, adopted in 1979 in Vienna (Austria).

"Working together, our nations become more difficult for the nuclear material from falling into the hands of terrorists," said the American president.

Obama declared that "no terrorist group could have a nuclear weapon or a dirty bomb," but noted that al Qaeda seeks long nuclear material and the Islamic State (EI) used chemical weapons.

"There is no doubt that if these madmen (the Islamic State) tivesem access to a bomb or nuclear material, would use it to kill as many innocent people as possible," he said.

If nuclear weapons fall into the hands of terrorist groups such as EI, it would, according to Obama, a "humanitarian catastrophe" that would "change our world" and would have "global ramifications for decades."

The president stressed that the main challenge facing the international community in the nuclear field is the risk that a terrorist group obtain such weapons, which would be "a major threat to global security."

"This is the perfect twenty-first century the challenge of example that no nation can solve alone, which must be resolved in coalition," he noted.

The Nuclear Security Summit, which began yesterday with a dinner at the White House and ends today, is the fourth since Obama launched this initiative in 2010 and held every two years.

The meeting in Washington has the participation of over 50 leading countries, with the notable absence of Russia, the nation with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.