The US Department of Energy has been forced to stop paying about 100,000 subcontractors involved in the nuclear arsenal modernization program due to the partial suspension of government funding (shutdown).

Axar.az informs that US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said this in an interview with Bloomberg TV.

"We are engaged in the modernization of the nuclear arsenal at the Department of Energy. We have 100,000 contractors involved in this work - they are not government employees, so the suspension of funding will deprive them of their payments. We have been paying them until today, but we will not be able to do this tomorrow or Monday. They will stop working on the modernization of our nuclear weapons," he said.

According to Wright, if the "shutdown" continues, this may lead to a loss of momentum in the strategic weapons modernization program.