Depleted uranium at the Lebanon’s Zahrani oil installations are used for research, Official

Shafaq News / The director of the Zahrani oil installations in the south of Lebanon, Ziad Al-Zein, revealed that the nuclear materials found at a warehouse are two kilograms-capsules contain depleted uranium.

Al-Zein said "the eight capsules are used for scientific research; they were brought to Lebanon in the 1950s, when the oil installations were operated by the U.S. Company Medrico, and before the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).”

Earlier, Lebanon’s outgoing prime minister said that experts had found “dangerous chemicals” at a warehouse at the Zahrani oil installations in the south.

Hassan Diab said the country’s atomic energy authority identified the substances as “nuclear” after reviewing a report by German company Combi Lift, which Lebanon had tasked with clearing hazardous material at Beirut port.

The comments came nearly eight months after a stockpile of chemicals detonated in Beirut, killing nearly 200 people in one of the largest non-nuclear explosions on record. The ammonium nitrate went up in flames after being stored unsafely at the port for years.