Over a dozen nations attend workshop to target weapons smuggling by terrorists

A workshop was held this week at the United Kingdom's Wilton Park agency compound in Steyning, England, by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the U.K. Department of Energy and Climate Change on ways to boost security and fight weapons trafficking in the world's maritime supply chain.

 A total of 55 participants from 15 countries and nine international groups took part in the workshop.

The workshop aimed to provide guidance on how to prevent, detect and respond to illegal trafficking of radiological and nuclear materials by terrorists. The action plans developed at this meeting will be presented at the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit.

“By engaging the international community to identify best practices, coordinating mechanisms and international standards in the area of radiation detection, we will strengthen radiation-detection programs at major shipping ports,” Eleanor Melamed, associate assistant deputy administrator for Global Material Security at the NNSA, said.  “These steps will increase global maritime security by building capacity to identify and safely remove detected materials and place them back under regulatory control.”