RIA Novosti: East Ukraine separatist spokesman denies reported plans to create “dirty bomb”

(RIA Novosti – August 1, 2015)

Documents provided by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), which have been mentioned by the foreign mass media and which allegedly contain information about development of a “dirty nuclear bomb” by members of the militia, are Kiev’s “yet another lie” and attempt to discredit the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), RIA Novosti (part of the state-owned International News Agency Rossiya Segodnya) reported on 1 August, quoting the deputy commander of the headquarters of the DPR militia, Eduard Basurin.

Quoting documents provided by the SBU, the Times newspaper earlier reported that members of the militia together with Russian nuclear scientists were allegedly developing a “dirty nuclear bomb” using radioactive waste from a bunker of the Donetsk chemical plant.

“This is yet another lie on the part of Ukraine. In this way they are simply trying to show that people who live here are terrorists. Such a bunker really exists in Donetsk, but no-one knows exactly what it contains. Naturally, no-one has opened it,” RIA Novosti quoted Basurin as saying.

At the same time, the secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defence Council, Oleksandr Turchynov, earlier said, answering journalists’ question as to whether Ukraine could create a “dirty” bomb, that Kiev will use all the available resources, including for development of effective weapons, and “what it is then, dirty or clean – this is already a separate technological question”, RIA Novosti added.