Nuclear Threat Initiative
The Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization founded in 2001 by Ted Turner and Sam Nunn in the United States, which exists to strengthen global security by reducing the spread of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, and also to reduce the risk that they will actually be used.
NTI is an operational organization, actively engaged in developing, shaping and implementing projects. In addition to building global awareness, NTI engages in model programs to inspire private and governmental efforts toward threat reduction.
In 2002 the NTI provided the $5 million of private money needed to add to the $3 million from the US government to safely move 48 kg of highly enriched uranium (enough for two nuclear weapons) from the defunct Vinča nuclear reactor near Belgrade to a facility in the Russian Federation to be blended down for use as a conventional nuclear fuel.
As part of its focus to secure nuclear materials worldwide, NTI helped create the World Institute for Nuclear Security, or WINS, established in Vienna in 2008. Today, the organization has more than 250 members from almost 50 countries. The Economist wrote, “WINS is a place where, for the first time, those with the practical responsibility for looking after nuclear materials—governments, power plant operators, laboratories, universities—can meet to swap ideas and develop best practices.”
UN Security Council Resolution 1887 supported the WINS mission, calling for states to “share best practices with a view to improved safety standards and nuclear security practices and raise standards of nuclear security to reduce the risk of nuclear terrorism.”
The Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) serves as the Secretariat for the Nuclear Security Project, in cooperation with the Hoover Institution. Former Secretary of State George P. Shultz, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger and former Senator Sam Nunn have joined together to form the Nuclear Security Project—an effort to galvanize global action to reduce urgent nuclear dangers and build support for reducing reliance on nuclear weapons, ultimately ending them as a threat to the world.
The organization produced the 2005 film, Last Best Chance, which aired on HBO, as well as the 2010 documentary film Nuclear Tipping Point.
Read more about Nuclear Threat Initiative: NTI's Leadership
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