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Stardate 20011106.1112 (On Screen): It's reported that undercover police in Turkey purchased two and a half pounds of Uranium from smugglers, who claimed it was "weapons grade" (i.e. that it was nearly pure U-235). I think they're going to find that it's a scam. If it is Uranium at all I suspect it's either unrefined or even DU. But if it is actually U-235 then the smugglers will get the death sentence, not from the nation of Turkey, but from the Uranium itself. It's not safe to be close to that much of the stuff for long periods.

Based on what I know, that amount is nothing like enough to make a bomb, but it would be a serious start. I hope this turns out to be a hoax, because if it isn't then the idea of a lot of U-235 running around on the black market is a pretty scary prospect. (discuss)

Update: I'm informed by a reliable source that first of all, a quantity of U-235 that small can be handled safely. At that quantity its level of fission is imperceptible and the metal itself acts as shielding so that only the outer part becomes a source of radiation. My source also informs me that this is tiny by comparison to the amount of U-235 which really would be needed to produce a weapon. The official IAEA "significant quantity" of U-235 is 25 kg. For U-233 or Plutonium it is much smaller, but neither of those occur naturally. Plutonium-239 is manufactured by neutron activation of U-238 (which creates U-239, which beta-decays to Np-239, which beta decays to Pu-239), and U-233 is manufactured by neutron activation of Th-232 (with a double-beta-decay via Pa-233). Both of them have a much shorter half-life than U-235, and thus the quantity needed for critical mass is much lower.

Anyway, according to my source, the only way a kilo of U-235 would be harmful is if it were set on fire and the fumes breathed in. Given that U-235 is a pyrophore that's not actually a trivial concern, but it doesn't seem to have happened.