Report: Ground lost on bioterror

WASHINGTON — President-elect Obama will likely confront a biological or nuclear attack at home or abroad if the United States and its allies do not act decisively to prevent it, according to a report released this week by a panel created by Congress.

The report found that the United States had taken important steps to counteract nuclear proliferation and, to a lesser extent, biological terrorism, but had "not kept pace with growing risks."

The nine-member bipartisan commission presented its conclusions Wednesday to Vice President-elect Joseph Biden and to Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, Obama's nominee for homeland security secretary.

"We have been losing ground, and we are less secure today than we have been in the recent past," said former Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., commission chairman, as the panel released its findings Wednesday.

The report concluded that biological agents pose the most imminent threat to the United States among weapons of mass destruction. The spread of biotechnology and the corresponding rise of poorly secured and regulated pathogens around the world have put the United States in an increasingly precarious situation, Graham said.

The Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism said U.S. security is threatened by nuclear-weapons programs in Iran, North Korea and Pakistan, given its history of political instability and arsenal of several dozen nuclear warheads.

The report, ordered by Congress last year, made several recommendations about reorganizing agencies aimed at slowing the spread of nuclear weapons. It also encouraged Obama to devote one White House official to coordinating intelligence and foreign policy on combating the spread of nuclear and biological weapons.

Obama has said that, as president, he would accelerate work to lock down nuclear material around the world.