Deployment of forensic techniques with respect to nuclear terrorism
The Netherlands and the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI) can play a significant role in combating nuclear terrorism by applying state-of-the-art forensic techniques. The NFI is willing to offer its services in an international context.
Prime Minister Balkenende states this in his speech at the Nuclear Security Summit (NSS) in Washington. The summit was organised by President Obama to make agreements on the security of nuclear materials.
Appeal
The Prime Minister invited those present to join the Netherlands and share their knowledge and expertise in the relevant fields with each other. This follows on from active efforts of the Netherlands and the NFI for international cooperation in the fight against nuclear terrorism.
Expertise
At the summit, over forty countries spoke about the investigation and combating of the smuggling of nuclear materials. The NFI has state-of-the-art forensic-technical knowledge and expertise. Physical, chemical, but certainly also digital techniques, can be deployed to combat chemical, biological, radioactive and nuclear terrorism. Think for example of data analysis to recognise suspicious patterns in large amounts of data and of biometrical expertise, such as facial recognition and visualising latent fingerprints.
Three-dimensional
NFI experts can recover seriously damaged digital data so that these data can be used to investigate suspects. The NFI also has very advanced digital techniques that enable it to make a three-dimensional image of a (nuclear) crime scene, which reveals, inter alia, invisible forensic traces, including those related to nuclear material, and which enables it to reconstruct, for example, an attack.
More attention
The NFI is one of the few forensic institutes with a CBRN programme. CBRN stands for chemical, biological, radioactive and nuclear materials. The NFI, together with the FBI, plays a significant role in this field. In June 2009, the NFI called for more attention for forensic investigation in combating nuclear terrorism at the GICNT (international summit in The Hague).