Japanese crime boss trafficked nuclear material from Myanmar, US says

A man identified by federal prosecutors as the leader of Japan's Yakuza organized crime syndicate was charged Wednesday with trafficking uranium and plutonium from Myanmar with the expectation that Iran would use the material to make nuclear weapons.

The man, Takeshi Ebisawa, is accused of conspiring with a network of associates to sell weapons materials and illegal narcotics and buy surface-to-air missiles on behalf of an ethnic insurgent group in Myanmar, the country formerly known as Burma. .

“It is impossible to overstate the seriousness of the conduct alleged in today's indictment,” Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, said in announcing the charges.

Mr. Ebisawa, 60, is being held in a federal prison in Brooklyn after being charged, along with three co-defendants, with international drug and weapons trafficking in 2022. He has pleaded not guilty to these charges. An attorney representing him in connection with that charge did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.