MOSCOW, July 21 (RIA Novosti) - The Federal Customs Service (FTS) opened the Center for Response and Customs Control over fissionable and radioactive materials (FRM) Thursday.
The center was created within the framework of the joint Russian-U.S. project on the struggle against FRM proliferation. It is part of the information system created under the Second Line of Defense program, a joint project of the FTS and the U.S. Department of Energy.
The U.S. Department of Energy proposed cooperation on the program in 1998.
Russian companies participating in the program concluded contracts with the U.S. Department of Energy's labs and installed advanced customs control equipment at road, airport, railroad and seaport customs offices.
Currently, about 50% of Russian Yantar systems at customs offices have been installed with the support of the U.S. government under the program.
In 2004, thanks to the system, the FTS detected more than 200 attempts of the transit of goods and vehicles with increased levels of ionizing radiation, said FTS senior official Vladimir Shamakhov.
"The Russian Yantar system has been installed at 90% of customs offices on the Russian border in recent years," he said.
Nikolai Kravchenko, deputy head of the Main Directorate of Information Technologies at the FTS, said the main threat comes from the legal transport of fissionable radioactive materials.
"It is very important to prevent the contraband of FRM during a legal shipment," he said. "We had cases when, during a legal shipment, the materials listed in a declaration had been substituted with other materials," Kravchenko said.
He said Russia has a unique system of control over legal FRM shipments that allows it to check the transported materials without opening containers.
