Government ignores cargo scanning law, port operator says.

• Position: SECURITY BEAT

The Department of Homeland Security is ignoring a law that calls on it to monitor, by 2012, every container that enters a U.S. port, an executive at one of the world's leading port-operating companies charged. The United States is opening itself up to a nuclear attack of economic catastrophe, he said.

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"The vulnerabilities are as great as they've ever been," said Gary Gilbert, senior vice president of Hutchison Port Holdings, at a National Defense Industrial Association homeland security conference. "We've got all these containers going around. We don't know where they are, and we don't know where they've been."

In 2006, Congress passed the Safe Port Act, which directs Customs and Border Protection to implement a program that would screen for radiation and contraband every container entering the country. In 2007, Congress passed the 9/11 Commission Act, which set a 2012 deadline for the department to put the program in place. The law, however, allows the department to apply for two-year deadline extensions. CBP, under the Bush administration, made no secret that it opposed the congressional mandate.

"We have a law on the books, and nobody gives a rat's," Gilbert said. "And as a leader in the industry, my company is very concerned. What happens if we have a calamity in a container?"

If nuclear materials were discovered in a cargo shipment, it would cause severe damage to the world economy, he added. Every...