L 354/30 Official Journal of the European Communities 30. 12. 97 COMMISSION COMMISSION DECISION of 12 December 1997 relating to a procedure in application of Article 83 of the Euratom Treaty (XVII-06 — Enusa Juzbado) (Only the Spanish text is authentic) (97/873/Euratom) THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community, and in particular Article 83 thereof, Having given the Empresa Nacional del Uranio, SA (Spain) the opportunity to express its point of view on the objections raised by the Commission, Whereas: I. THE FACTS This Decision concerns the undeclared export of nuclear material from Spain to the United States of America by Empresa Nacional del Uranio, SA, hereinafter referred to as ‘Enusa’, during the month of February 1997. Enusa is the operator of a nuclear fuel fabrication plant, ‘Fébrica de Elementos Combustibles de Juzbado', located in Juzbado, Salamanca (Spain). The nuclear material required for this industrial activity is purchased in the form of uranium dioxide powder which is transported from its suppliers to Juzbado in drums which, after having been emptied, are shipped back to the supplier. A regular supplier of this uranium dioxide is, among others, General Electric in Wilmington, North Carolina (USA), hereinafter referred to as ‘GE’. Following a letter of 19 March 1997 from Enusa to the Euratom Safeguards Directorate of the Commission to which was attached a report made by Enusa relating to the incident which is the subject of this Decision, and the hearing held in Luxembourg in the offices of the Commission on 16 April 1997, the following facts were established and are agreed between Enusa and the Commission: — during December 1996, six drums containing 13 kilo- grams of natural uranium, 65 826 grams of uranium enriched to 3,95 %, and 3675 grams of uranium enriched to 4,4 % needed to be stored on the premises of the installation. The selected storage area was the same hall as that in which Enusa routinely stored full drums received from their uranium dioxide suppliers, and where also such drums are collected after being emptied for shipping back to the original supplier, — since this storage area was located outside the controlled area, the six drums needed packaging, which was done in a way very similar to the way empty drums are conditioned for shipments as well: the same type of transport containers (three in total) were used for that purpose, — according to internal procedures, these three full transport containers should have been properly labelled and sealed in order to indicate clearly that they contained nuclear material and were not empty. Also, the transfer to that storage area should have been registered in the plant computer. In this case however, seals were correctly applied but no labels were attached on the transport containers and also the transfer to that storage area was not booked in, — as a result, the three full transport containers stood in the same room as the empty containers, and this was also the room from where shipments of empty con- tainers were organized. The three abovementined full containers could therefore only be distinguished from the empty one by the existence of a tiny seal; other- wise the outward appearance was identical, — during this time a control of the physical existence of articles containing nuclear material was carried out in accordance with internal control procedures. This control revealed that the six drums in question were missing from the process area. Thereupon the