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60-538: A warehouse at the Ulba Metallurgical Plant outside Ust-Kamenogorsk housed 1,322 pounds (600 kg) of weapons grade enriched uranium to fuel Alfa class submarines (90% U-235). Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union , the fuel was poorly documented and secured, and in danger of being sold for use in the construction of nuclear weapons. This mission stands as a successful attempt of

120-828: A fort and trading post named Ust-Kamennaya . It was established according to the order of the Russian Emperor Peter the Great , who sent a military expedition headed by major Ivan Vasilievich Likharev in the search of Yarkenda gold. Likharev's expedition directed up the Irtysh River to Zaysan Lake . There, at the confluence of the Ulba and the Irtysh rivers the new fortress was laid – the Ust-Kamennaya Fortress. The Ust-Kamennaya Fortress appeared on

180-519: A city with a lot of heavy industry, the atmosphere of the city holds the by-products of the heavy metals production: nitrogen dioxide , sulfur dioxide , Zn, Cd, Cl, As, C, Be, phenol , benzol , NaOH, NH3, radioactivity etc. in general there are about 170 polluting components found in the city. There are 3 impact points that are influenced in Oskemen. The atmosphere is hit most. With a poor urban ventilation (the average percentage of calm 48%), with

240-605: A collective ceiling of $ 4 billion among the five selected contractors. DTRA awarded BV the first BTRIC in Ukraine in 2008, which "is a vital part" of the CTR, entitled Biological Threat Reduction (BTR). The Implementing (Executive) Agents were three in number: the Ukraine Ministry of Health , Ukraine Academy of Agrarian Sciences and Ukraine State Committee for Veterinary Medicine . In July 2008 President Medvedev signed

300-610: A country secretly moving in to another country to protect them from the dangers of nuclear weapons left behind by the Soviet Union. Careless nuclear testing in the northeast of Kazakhstan as a result of the Cold War and the arms race between the Soviet Union and the United States resulted in the spread of belief in ' nuclear neuralgia ' amongst the country's citizens. The development of these health issues as well as

360-423: A large number of vehicles and stationary sources relevance of air pollution in Oskemen is not in doubt. The concentration of harmful substances in the air is increasing each year because of the nature of the companies which are looking for increases in the production and profits. As usual, the pollution is enhanced by the low quality of car fuels and an increase in the number of cars. As a result of all this, Oskemen

420-557: A plan to further reduce U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals , which would further reduce the number of nuclear weapons in the world today. This plan was the result of the impending expiration of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty ( START I ). START was set to expire in December 2009. In October 2012 the second Putin administration declared that Russia would not extend the CTR agreement without changes in

480-469: A result of large production of uranium and presence of other radioactive elements such thorium, radon or radioactive dust the radioactive background of the city is remarkable with the zones of radioactive anomaly which are spread around the city. Oskemen is known to be the leader in Kazakhstan by the number of people having respiratory problems and the diseases of immune system. The statistics show that

540-404: A supply mechanism of last resort for IAEA member states. The LEU bank is a physical stock of 90 metric tons of LEU hexaflouride, enough uranium to power a large city for three years. The facility was wholly funded by IAEA member states and other contributions for a total of $ 150 million. This is expected to cover costs for 20 years. Responsibility for safety, security, and safeguarding falls under

600-487: A variety of programs. Briefly, these include: The CTR program is authorized by Title 22 of the United States Code , chapter 68a. The FY 2007 CTR Annual Report to Congress provides a status update on the program as a whole and individual initiatives. It also details future planned endeavors in each area. The Nunn-Lugar Act was a major contributor to de-escalation of nuclear weapon arsenals. This program

660-449: Is Vostok Stadium . Oskemen hosted the national rink bandy championship in 2014 and the national amateur bandy championship in 2018. With ethnic Russians comprising the demographic majority of the population, Orthodox Christianity is the dominant religion of Oskemen. There are 32 religious unions, presenting 15 religious confessions, including Muslim , Christian , and non-traditional religions. There are 21 cultural buildings in

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720-747: Is at the railway station, which is located by the Sports Palace on Novoshkolnaya Street. From this station, buses not only serve cities within Kazakhstan, but also Russian cities such as Krasnoyarsk. The route network at the second station covers a smaller area with 17 lines. Oskemen has a humid continental climate ( Köppen climate classification Dfb ). The coldest months are November through March. Record low temperatures range from −49 °C in January to 4 °C in July, and record highs range from 8 °C in January to 43 °C in July. As expected in

780-545: Is often recognized as one of the most polluted regional centers of Kazakhstan. The most polluted rivers of the Republic are those flowing through the territory of the East Kazakhstan region, where the highest index of surface water pollution is observed in the mining areas and enrichment of polymetallic ores. Mostly the water is affected through the industrial wastes and the storages of waste. Contamination of

840-561: Is the largest city in the east of Kazakhstan and the administrative center of East Kazakhstan Region of Kazakhstan . The city has two official names. In the Kazakh language, its name is Өскемен/ Oskemen and in the Russian language it is known as Усть-Каменогорск. Both names appear on the seal of the city. The city was founded in 1720 at the confluence of the Irtysh and Ulba rivers as

900-545: The National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and Arms Control to discuss the next ten years regarding the CTR program. The committee found that the Cooperative, or "C", in CTR was found to be central in reducing threats through transparency and action further strengthening world relations while mitigating dangers to the U.S. Sustainable partnerships between new and existing countries under

960-572: The Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction , were vital to former Soviet countries such as Kazakhstan, Belarus, and Ukraine in that they prevented the proliferation of Post Soviet nuclear materials. There are currently 9 members in the nuclear club including The United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea. The Netflix documentary series Turning Point: The Bomb and

1020-609: The United States and their NATO allies grew concerned of the risk of nuclear weapons held in the Soviet republics falling into enemy hands. The Cooperative Threat Reduction ( CTR ) program was initiated by the Nunn–Lugar Act (really the Soviet Nuclear Threat Reduction Act of 1991 ), which was authored and cosponsored by Sens . Sam Nunn ( D - GA ) and Richard Lugar ( R - IN ). The purpose of

1080-736: The Ural Mountains , the site is expected to destroy some 5,500 tons of chemical agents, including Sarin and VX . About one-third of the funding to build the plant, roughly $ 1 billion, was provided by CTR. Although the budget for the CTR program has been cut every year since the Obama administration began, the US still faces many issues when it comes to agreements with Russia in nuclear arms reduction. President Obama had his own ideas for nuclear threat reduction. He and Hillary Clinton tried to reset nuclear relations with Russia . This plan included

1140-621: The ice hockey club HC Torpedo (officially Kazzinc-Torpedo, commonly referred to as Torpedo Ust-Kamenogorsk). Torpedo's men's representative team plays in the Supreme Hockey League (VHL), of which it was a founding member, and the women's representative team plays in the Kazakh Women's Ice Hockey League. The men's farm team , Altay-Torpedo , competes in the Kazakhstan Hockey Championship and

1200-660: The 9/11 terrorist attacks, knowledge regarding Pakistani nuclear weaponry and nuclear scientists was unclear making it a strong candidate from American political leaders for Nunn-Lugar. Border crossing between Pakistan and Afghanistan militants made U.S. officials uneasy, this alongside the allegations of nuclear arms smuggling caused further talk of Nunn-Lugar program expansion in 2011. Senator Richard Lugar has expressed his concern regarding Pakistani nuclear weapons of mass destruction along with concerns over potential pathogenic and infectious disease security. Lugar also stated that if an outbreak occurs, if Pakistan accepts transparency with

1260-641: The CTR Program was originally "to secure and dismantle weapons of mass destruction and their associated infrastructure in former Soviet Union states." As the peace dividend grew old, an alternative 2009 explanation of the program was "to secure and dismantle weapons of mass destruction in states of the former Soviet Union and beyond". The CTR program funds have been disbursed since 1997 by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA). CTR provided funding and expertise for states in

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1320-603: The CTR does more good than harm which has led to funding expansion. This expansion of the program is displayed in the 1997 Defense Authorization Act whose purposed served in securing chemical and biological weapon materials. In contrast, opponents say that the US funding is going to other Russian programs. Going into the 21st century, efforts now have an expanded focus including a more generalized nuclear nonproliferation motive. In 2003 Libya decided upon giving up on their nuclear weapons program. Funding from Nunn-Lugar allowed for secure transportation of nuclear materials from Libya to

1380-669: The CTR initiative. Weapons deactivated and destroyed under this program include: Other milestone results include: One Nunn–Lugar site, Pavlograd , Ukraine, dedicated itself beginning in June 2004 to the decommissioning of nuclear missiles without burning their solid rocket fuel , thus preventing dioxins from threatening the local environment and human population. The Pavlograd missile factory PMZ has been converted to an advanced astronautics "Space Clipper" program. Other countries are finding ways to produce, test, and acquire weapons of mass destruction. In an attempt to regulate WMD globally,

1440-632: The CTR program, the U.S. will be able to provide aid and establish systems to combat an outbreak. Subsequent programs have built on the CTR, including the Proliferation Security Initiative , initially launched by President Bush in cooperation with Poland in 2003, and built on by multilateral efforts and then by President Obama. In 2008 the DTRA awarded Black & Veatch the first of its Biological Threat Reduction Integrating Contracts (BTRIC). The five-year IDIQ contract has

1500-640: The Clinton Administration announced that the uranium had been removed. Since Project Sapphire, HEU has been removed from 20 research reactors from various former Soviet bloc nations. This project shows how through the United States' economic, diplomatic, and technical resources, Kazakhstan was able to draw closer in its effort to become a nonnuclear weapons state. The effects from Project Sapphire are seen today in U.S. foreign policy and trade. The U.S.'s nuclear clean out programs, such as

1560-752: The Cold War covers Project Sapphire at about the 50-minute mark of Episode 7 - The End of History. In the novel Performance Anomalies , the clandestine removal of weapons-grade uranium under Project Sapphire was not complete, resulting in a secret cache of uranium in Kazakhstan that attracts jihadis. There is also a movie about Project Sapphire, sharing its name, in development as of 2022. Oskemen Oskemen ( Kazakh : Өскемен , romanized :  Öskemen [ʉ̯ɵskʲeˈmʲen] ( listen ) ) or Ust-Kamenogorsk (Russian: Усть-Каменогорск , IPA: [ˌʊsʲtʲ kəmʲɪnɐˈgorsk] )

1620-726: The Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction has stepped outside of the former Soviet Union states. 2003 marked an important year for CTR expansion as the initiative was accepted by congress allowing the spread to countries not included within the prior Soviet Union. The Nunn-Lugar Expansion Act under the 108th congress granted up to $ 50 million to be used outside the former Soviet Union which focused primarily on Albania, North Korea, Iraq, and Libya. Over time Nunn-Lugar has received many supporters and also many critics. Continuation and expansion has been up for debate since its initial formation in 1991. Proponents argue that

1680-485: The Obama administration's second term." As far as reducing nuclear weapons in other countries, besides Ukraine, there is more of a chance of an agreement. This idea is explained in "countering nuclear weapons proliferation to states and to nonstate actors, the prospects are somewhat better, given mutual Russian and U.S. concerns in that area". There are still many agreements that have been proposed that can be passed between

1740-455: The Soviet Union had in the newly formed country. Kazakhstan's HEU was left behind by a Soviet submarine project and there was enough of the material to fuel 24 atomic bombs. The uranium-235 was 90-91% enriched in pure metal form. After months of preparation, 31 agents forming the specialised Nuclear Emergency Recovery Team were recruited in October 1994 to embark on a covert mission to remove

1800-478: The Soviet Union. The Nunn-Lugar Act was inspired and sponsored by Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar to take on Project Sapphire and dismantle nuclear weapons in Former Soviet blocs as showed in Kazakhstan. The fall of the Soviet Union left nuclear weapons materials spread across developing countries. Two United States Senators, Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar , in office at the time, saw the importance of monitoring

1860-702: The UMW's beryllium production line in 1990 led to the diffusion of a highly toxic beryllium-containing "cloud" over the city. The health effects of this incident are not entirely known, partly because the incident was kept secret by the Soviet authorities. In 2017, the Ulba Metallurgical Plant was inaugurated by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as the home of the Low Enriched Uranium (LEU) bank - which serves as

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1920-651: The US and Russia as far as nuclear weapons and the control and elimination of them are concerned. As time progresses, the threat of nuclear weapons and the money needed to spend on the elimination of them diminishes. The CTR program has faced many budget cuts since its beginning in 1986 because the program was, as opined by one observer, "created to deal with yesterday's strategic weapons and yesterday's threats have largely diminished". In January 2015 Russian Federation representatives told their US counterparts that Russia would no longer accept US assistance in securing stored weapons-grade nuclear material but said they would continue

1980-900: The United States of America and the Russian Federation Concerning the Safe and Secure Transportation, Storage and Destruction of Weapons and the Prevention of Weapons Proliferation , commonly known as the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Umbrella Agreement that expires today. This new bilateral framework authorizes the United States and the Russian Federation to work in several areas of nonproliferation collaboration, including protecting, controlling, and accounting for nuclear materials." Under

2040-576: The United States. Albania had possession of 16 tons of chemical weapons which were disclosed and disposed of through the Nunn-Lugar program. Nunn-Lugar funds in the year 2004, under the Bush presidency, were provided to eliminate all chemical weapons held within Albania which amounted to roughly $ 38.5 million. After just 3 years Albania no longer possessed chemical weapons of mass destruction. After

2100-535: The United States. Finally economics pushed Kazakhstan towards de-nuclearization because the country's large oil reserves could only be sourced by Western technology. Obtaining this western support would only be possible with non-nuclear proliferation and joining the NPT . The Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program was established in 1986 in order to minimize the threat of nuclear proliferation especially in Asia and

2160-648: The adoption of Gorbachev's glasnost campaign sparked a public anti-nuclear movement in Kazakhstan. The independence of Kazakhstan also saw the rise of leaders who sought to differentiate themselves from the former communist nation. Once a part of the USSR , Kazakhstan was very reliant on relations with Russia in the 90's. With millions of ethnic Russians living in the country, leaders of Kazakhstan did not want to create trouble because of Russia's influence on their economics, factories, and technology. They also wanted to remove post-Soviet nuclear materials because Kazakhstan lacked

2220-425: The aid of the elimination of nuclear weapons in this country. The Nunn-Lugar Act played a major role in a huge decrease in the quantity of nuclear weapons that had been stockpiled during the nuclear escalation period. Another important contribution was seen when the US sent storage containers to Russia to store fissionable material under Russian control. The US provided "10,000 fissile material storage containers by

2280-425: The city is very closely intertwined with the Soviet nuclear bomb project , and the city was therefore kept closed to outsiders. The number of enterprises in Oskemen is very high relative to the number of people living there. There are about 169 firms according to the data from 2002. Most of them are industrial firms, working in mining and processing of raw materials, mostly heavy metals . The highest lock in

2340-400: The city: among them Orthodox Christian churches and mosques . However, in 2017 a court fined and banned Oskemen's New Life Protestant Church for singing religious songs at a summer camp. The city has an international airport, Oskemen Airport . Oskemen's tram system has 4 lines. Intercity bus service is available at two bus stations. The most extensive network, with more than 35 lines,

2400-750: The disarmament of nuclear warheads in many counties. The Nunn-Lugar program eliminated former strategic weapons outside of Russia. This was most evident in the removal of these weapons in Ukraine, after the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances . There were many countries that had Soviet nuclear weapons. Two others included Belarus and Kazakhstan. Nunn-Lugar helped Russia to move the nuclear arsenals in these countries to Russia or to dismember these weapons in these countries. The US sent "nearly 700 emergency response items to help guarantee safe and secure transportation of nuclear weapons" to Belarus for

2460-455: The end of 1995 and a total of nearly 33,000 containers by early 1997". These containers aided in Russia's ability to store nuclear material from dismantled warheads. Another contribution from the US to Russia was "75 million dollars to help Russia build a new fissile material storage facility at Chelyabinsk for plutonium "pits" from dismantled warheads". The Nuclear Threat Reduction program

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2520-468: The entire mission would have been compromised. The team found 1032 containers in the warehouse and repacked the material into 448 shipping containers. Bad weather set in and on the way to the airport the trucks carrying the HEU were almost compromised due to the ice and sleet. Finally the plane was loaded and flown for 20 hours (the longest flight for a C-5 in U.S. history) back to Delaware. On November 23, 1994,

2580-717: The facilities and technical capacity to sustain nuclear weapons. Prior to the collapse of the USSR, Kazakhstan's first president Nazarbayev announced that the country would be a non-nuclear state once it was admitted into the United Nations. In May 1992, Nazarbayev joined the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons . Further conversations with US president George H. W. Bush and senators Richard Lugar and Sam Nunn created stronger ties between Kazakhstan and

2640-502: The former Soviet Union (including Russia , Ukraine , Georgia , Azerbaijan , Belarus , Uzbekistan , and Kazakhstan ) to decommission nuclear , biological , and chemical weapon stockpiles, as agreed by the Soviet Union under disarmament treaties such as SALT I . This funding totaled $ 400 million a year for a total of four years. This $ 400 million was given to CTR-related defense programs. The Departments of Defense (DOD), Energy (DOE), state, and commerce were subject to distribute

2700-458: The funding. After the nuclear warheads were removed from their delivery vehicles by the post-Soviet successor militaries, Nunn-Lugar assistance provided equipment and supplies to destroy the missiles on which the warheads had been mounted, as well as the silos which had contained the missiles. The warheads themselves were then shipped to and destroyed in Russia, with the highly enriched uranium contained within made into commercial reactor fuel, which

2760-411: The location of these materials, so that they could help prevent nuclear proliferation . It was a fear that the lack of monitoring would result in the aid of underdeveloped or threatening countries that did not previously have access to this weapons grade materials. In the early 1990s, the two senators were able to deduce a number of resources that Kazakhstan had because they became aware of the resources

2820-667: The map of the Russian Empire, the very southern end of the Irtysh line. In 1868 the city became the capital of the Semipalatinsk Oblast . It was the site of Georgy Malenkov 's 30-year internal exile , during which he managed a local hydroelectric plant. One of the main industrial enterprises, the Ulba Metal Works (UMW) which produced and still produces uranium products, was kept entirely secret despite it employing thousands of workers. An explosion at

2880-784: The men's under-20 team, Altay , plays in the Eastern Conference of the Junior Hockey League (MHL). Torpedo is the alma mater of NHL players Nik Antropov , Vitali Kolesnik , Evgeni Nabokov , Alexander Perezhogin , and Konstantin Pushkaryov . The football club FC Vostok Oskemen was a founding member of the Kazakhstan Premier League and currently plays in the Kazakhstan First Division . The team's home ground

2940-414: The most frequent diseases are respiratory diseases and urogenital system diseases. In the last years, the number of people having cancer has been also increasing. Oskemen is twinned with: 49°59′N 82°37′E  /  49.983°N 82.617°E  / 49.983; 82.617 Nunn%E2%80%93Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction As the collapse of the Soviet Union appeared imminent,

3000-600: The new framework, Russia assumed the costs and the completion without further US assistance of two areas of bilateral CTR cooperation previously covered by the CTR framework: ballistic missile elimination and chemical weapons destruction. In Obama's second term , work on nuclear threat reduction was said to be more bleak because of the Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation . Arms Control Today opined that "the crisis in Ukraine probably has ruined prospects for another formal Russian-U.S. arms control agreement during

3060-496: The program on their own. Joint security work at numerous Russian sites and facilities was halted on 1 January 2015. In December 2014, the program awarded a $ 4 million contract to MRIGlobal to "configure, equip, deploy and staff two quick response mobile laboratory systems (MLS) to support the ongoing Ebola outbreak in West Africa ." The labs were deployed to Sierra Leone . In 2018, David Franz and Libby Turpen co-chaired

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3120-538: The ratification law to cooperate in "the elimination of reduced strategic offensive weapons, improving the safety of storing and transporting nuclear weapons, improving the physical protection of nuclear materials and the destruction of chemical weapons," retroactive to the signature of the protocol on 16 June 2006 for a term of seven years. In May 2009, Russia announced the opening of a major facility to decommission its chemical weapons reserves. Built near vast reserves of ex-Soviet weaponry at Shchuchye, Kurgan Oblast , in

3180-488: The responsibilities of local authorities in Osmeken. The city developed into a major mining and metallurgical center during the Soviet period. Processing of non-ferrous metals , especially uranium , beryllium , tantalum , copper , lead , silver and zinc remain important. It is a center for the construction industry producing manufactured housing and ferroconcrete articles. The post-war industrial history of

3240-488: The text. On 14 June 2013 the US and Russia signed a new bilateral framework on cooperative threat reduction intended to supersede the first CTR. The new agreement was intended to reinforce the longstanding partnership on nonproliferation between these two nations and their activities in Russia and the Former Soviet Republics (FSR). "This new framework builds upon the success of the 1992 Agreement between

3300-405: The uranium. On October 7, President Bill Clinton signed a classified directive to approve the airlift - composed of 3 C-5 aircraft - to leave from Delaware's Dover Air Force Base to Kazakhstan. The team spent 12 hours a day from October 14 to November 11 packing up uranium (including seven different types of uranium some laced with toxic beryllium). The project had to be under extreme secrecy or

3360-472: The water with lead, selenium , cadmium, nitrates spreads on many kilometers as a consequence of which a few drinking water intakes in the Western part of the city are closed or to be closed. The soil close to the industry territories holds the solid wastes of the firms and becomes less suitable for planting. An increasing number of industrial waste requires a large area for the storage of waste. As

3420-460: The world is the Oskemen Lock and lies at Ablaketka where it allows river traffic to pass around a hydroelectric dam on the Irtysh river. It has a drop of more than 40m. The city has three cinemas (although during the Soviet era, there were a lot more), three museums, and a drama theater with Russian and Kazakh (since 2000) troupes. Boris Alexandrov Sports Palace serves as home arena to

3480-513: Was not just used to remove everything fissionable from Russia; it also included ideas for safe storage and transportation of fissionable material in Russia built up during the Cold War. Ukraine and Kazakhstan are nuclear weapons free because of this program. Under CTR, the U.S. and recipient states have made considerable advancements in global security against the threat of WMD. By 1997 all strategic Soviet nuclear weapons were removed from Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine marking an important landmark in

3540-480: Was purchased by the United States under a separate program. In recent years, the CTR program has expanded its mission from securing WMDs at the root source to protecting against WMD "on the move", by enhancing land and maritime border security in the former Soviet Union. According to the CTR website in 2007, CTR had four key objectives: These objectives were compartmentalized into three program areas which include: These areas were then pursued and achieved through

3600-461: Was used for "the transportation, storage, safeguarding and destruction of nuclear and other weapons in the Soviet Union… and to assist in the prevention of weapons proliferation". One contribution by the Nunn-Lugar program has been the "delivery of equipment to accelerate the dismantlement of strategic nuclear delivery vehicles" to the Soviet Union. This program made important contributions in

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