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Mexico: FBI Issues Bulletin on Missing Cyanide Barrels By David Ruppe The truck carrying a reported 96 barrels of the highly toxic chemical was stolen May 10 in the Mexican state of Hidalgo, in the southern part of the country. It was found abandoned last Thursday with 76 barrels missing, a Mexican official reportedly said. Mexican state and federal authorities continue to search for the missing barrels and the four armed gunmen who stole the material. Mexican and U.S. authorities have said they believe the theft was the work of local criminals and not of terrorists. Nevertheless, U.S. authorities are concerned about the prospect the cyanide might be sold, smuggled over the border and misused. “We are working very closely with Mexican authorities in this investigation, because if any of this stuff gets across the border … obviously, chemicals of that sort could have sort of an environmental effect,” says FBI spokesman Bill Carter. He added, however, “I have no indication right now that the theft was due to a terrorist act, it looks more of something of a criminal nature than anything else.” Mexican authorities reportedly said the truck was stolen in an area where a local criminal gang is known to operate. Mexican State Ministerial Police Director Federico Perez Luna said recently he considered it unlikely for the material to so far have been smuggled into the United States since the truck was not headed toward the border, a Mexican newspaper reported. Carter characterized the FBI alert as somewhat routine. “There is an information bulletin that is put out each week … basically to inform law enforcement agencies about what has taken place and what the current information is concerning it,” he said. The missing cyanide has not prompted U.S. federal authorities to bump up the Homeland Security Advisory System threat level from the color code yellow, meaning “elevated risk” to the color red meaning “high risk,” according to the bulletin. The national threat level has been yellow, meaning there is a significant risk of terrorist attacks, since Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge announced the system March 12 (see GSN, March 13). Chemical of Concern In all, the truck was said to carry 10 metric tons of sodium cyanide in brick, nonliquid form, a chemical used in gold mining to extract gold from ore. Experts say as little as a teaspoonful of 2 percent solution of sodium cyanide could rapidly kill a human adult. In February, Italian police in Rome foiled a possible attack against the U.S. Embassy there by four Moroccan men using a relatively less toxic cyanide compound (see GSN, Feb. 25). Stanford University engineering professor Richard Luthy said a truckload of sodium cyanide would probably be needed to sufficiently poison a city water reservoir. Smaller amounts, however, could cause harm if introduced into a smaller supply of water. For example, a barrel could be used, he said, “If you wanted … to affect a neighborhood or an apartment house.” If the point was to terrorize, even nonharmful dilutions might be effective, he said. “If it were introduced, even if at low levels that were not particularly harmful then you would have fear and worry … you’d have a run on bottled water. And then you’d have probably mistrust of the water supply system in that area for some time,” he said. Luthy, who also chairs the National Research Council’s Water Science and Technology Board, has advocated greater federal spending to increase security of the U.S. water supplies and better monitoring by local authorities. He said water authorities might test for chemicals like sodium cyanide only once a month. The U.S. House of Representatives last year passed a bill to provide $12 million in funding over five years to improve technology and processes for securing water supply systems. The Senate has yet to act on the bill (see GSN, Dec. 20, 2001). Luthy testified before the House Science Committee last year that a minimum of $50 million needs to be spent. Congress also passed last year an emergency spending bill that provided $175 million to the Environmental Protection Agency to fund various counterterrorism activities including water system vulnerability assessments (see GSN, March 26).
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