Sadly, it appears to be true. And it is not the first report. During the autumn, I remember stories of villagers removing materials at a testing site for scrap. Some of it was so hot they could detect it from the helecopters. The troops found radioactive materials recently buried in the village, and many of the residents with radiation sickness. Most of this appears to be ignorance of radioactivity, which is really sad. These people are trying to survive and they are taking scrap and selling it to feed their families, not relaizing they may be killing them.

(Thanks for the links, Fox, I wrote this as you were posting...)

Reminds me of the incident in Brazil many ears ago when a man took apart an old x-ray machine. He took the cessium source, which is a fine powder, an passing it out as a novelty. At least a dozen people died (some had ingested it) and everything in contact with this powder had to be buried in concrete: people, furniture, houses.

Worse yet, if this material gets into the scrap, it can travel the world and wind up in consumer products.

From the AP:
Radioactive materials disappearing in Iraq.
"United Nations — Iraq's nuclear facilities remain unguarded, and radioactive materials are being taken out of the country, the UN's nuclear watchdog agency reported after reviewing satellite images and equipment that has turned up in European scrap yards.

The International Atomic Energy Agency sent a letter to U.S. officials three weeks ago informing them of the findings. The information was also sent to the UN Security Council in a letter from its director, Mohamed ElBaradei, that was circulated Thursday."