A Russian nuclear scientist, missing for the past 18 months, has mysteriously turned up in the Central Russian city of Krasnoyarsk.
Sergei Podoinitsyn, who as a scientist at a nuclear facility in the secretive defense industry had access to top secret nuclear information, turned up showing signs of partial amnesia, the Moscow Times reported Thursday.
Police said he disappeared Oct. 17, 2003, when he left by taxi for Krasnoyarsk with $9,000 to buy a car. He did not return and five days later prosecutors opened an investigation into his disappearance.
There was speculation Podoinitsyn had been kidnapped by foreign agents seeking to obtain nuclear secrets or that he had fled to the United States.
Police said Podoinitsyn's relatives reported the scientist called his wife and security authorities Saturday to tell them he was alive.
Podoinitsyn told his family he had worked for a while at a construction site but did not recall how he ended up there.
© Copyright 2005 by United Press International
