Make radioactive source security commitments legally binding

All countries and areas should strengthen security measures to protect radioactive sources with the following actions:

• Establish a regulatory body with clear authority and a statutory mandate for overseeing the security of radioactive sources across all applications
• Enact regulations that require security for all applications of high-activity radioactive sources
• Maintain a national registry of radioactive sources through the designated regulatory body to facilitate effective oversight of licensing, security, import, and export
• Develop and implement political commitments to replace high-activity radioactive sources with safer alternatives not suitable for use in a dirty bomb and facilitate the replacement process by seeking financial and in-kind support for partner governments and international institutions.

What the Data Show

The gap between political commitment and national implementation of radiological security is widening, with governments pledging adherence to international best practices but lagging in the development and implementation of security measures.

Data Details

Radioactive sources have a variety of applications worldwide, including medicine, agriculture, and industrial radiography. Although most radioactive sources are benign, high-activity sources can threaten human health if improperly secured. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has identified more than 20,000 operators of significant radioactive sources worldwide. Terrorist groups have historically expressed interest in gaining access to high-activity sources to build a dirty bomb—a source of radiation capable of spreading radioactivity over a large area coupled with a conventional explosive device. Some groups have come dangerously close to detonating this kind of weapon, including two incidents in the 1990s where Chechen rebels placed devices in Moscow’s Izmaylovsky Park and near a local railway line in Argun, Chechnya. More recently, the Islamic State nearly came into possession of two cobalt-60 radiotherapy devices during the occupation of Mosul, Iraq, in 2014, both of which could have provided high-activity radioactive material for use in a dirty bomb.

Fortunately, political commitment to abide by international guidance on radioactive source security continues to grow. Since the 2023 assessment, 8 additional countries support the IAEA’s Code of Conduct on the Safety and Security of Radioactive Sources, increasing the total to 148 countries. Twenty-six new countries have signed on to the IAEA’s Guidance on the Management of Disused Radioactive Sources, bringing the total to 75 countries.

However, these political commitments are nonbinding, and the regulatory frameworks that give them operational effect have not kept pace. Fifty-four countries and areas still lack any legal requirements for security measures to protect radioactive sources against illicit access, with just 3 countries improving on this measure since the 2023 assessment. This gap extends to basic oversight capacity: 90 countries and areas do not maintain a registry of radioactive sources—a foundational tool for tracking what needs to be secured.

Minimizing this gap between words and actions is the defining challenge for radioactive source security. Radiological terrorism is a serious global threat, and with roughly hundreds of thousands of high-activity radioactive sources worldwide, sustained gaps in tracking systems and security requirements are a vulnerability that governments must address.