Union's nukes should be under joint control – Nazarbayev
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ALMATY. Nov 25 (Interfax) – Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev reiterated that member states of the new Union should exercise joint control over the nuclear forces.
Media reports about Nazarbayev's "desire to drag nuclear arms into the Islamic world" prompted his remark. A statement published by the Kazakh presidential press service also said only dilettantes would talk about moving all nuclear arms to Russia because "there is a whole underground facility under every launch site and it is simply incomprehensible how they would be moved elsewhere." "This would require 25-30 billion rubles by the most modest estimates," the statement said.
The Semipalatinsk nuclear test site will become a scientific center and will work for science and economy, Nazarbayev said. However, no more nuclear blasts will take place there. About 500 nuclear tests have been held in Kazakhstan since 1949 and before the 1960s they were held in the open. "The Kazakh people survived thousands of Hiroshimas," Nazarbayev said, adding that the closure of the test site is the expression of people's will.