German prosecutors said today, Friday, that a soldier in the custody of law enforcement authorities was storing radioactive materials and classified documents along with a large arsenal of weapons, in a case that shook the national army.
A spokeswoman for the Frankfurt prosecutor’s office told AFP that the officer was found in possession of an unspecified amount of “strontium-90”, a dangerous carcinogen.
Charges of “unauthorized handling of radioactive materials” and violating the Military Arms Control Act are to be brought. Investigators previously uncovered a cache believed to belong to the captain during a raid in the town of Aldenhoven earlier this month.
The Defense Ministry said at the time that the weapons were not believed to be owned by the German military, while Der Spiegel magazine reported on Friday, citing ministry records, that most of the cache’s contents came from the former communist bloc countries.
The cache included Kalashnikov rifles, anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons and hand grenades. The unnamed suspect works at a military center to analyze improvised explosive devices.
In addition to strontium-90, which can be used in medicine and industry and can also be found in nuclear power plant waste, the man also had classified documents.
dealt with classified documents of the Foreign Intelligence Agency; The situation in North Korea. The military counterintelligence service has joined the ongoing investigation against the officer.
This comes after a series of issues that have confused the German army. Two former soldiers were arrested this week for trying to form a paramilitary gang of mercenaries to fight in the war in Yemen.
In the last period, the German army arrested several soldiers and dissolved an elite force, against the background of accusations of sexual assaults, sympathy for the extreme right and adopting Nazi ideas.