THE US government is so nervous about Ukraine’s arsenal of SS-19 nuclear missiles that Washington has agreed to help finance a new plant to dismantle them. Work began at Dnepropetrovsk last week, on a site used until recently to build Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles. From next October, the plant will be able to dismantle three missiles a month, says the Pentagon.
Components from the missiles will not be destroyed. “The Ukrainians want to salvage as much as possible,” says Cheri Abdelnour, a spokeswoman for the Pentagon’s Nuclear Defense Agency.
Ukraine is designing the plant and financing much of the construction; the US is providing industrial equipment such as mobile cranes and tractor trailer trucks. The US has so far spent $63 million helping Ukraine to dismantle its nuclear arsenal.
