Having read the technical description of the maintenance required of such a device, any coming out of the old Soviet Union would by now fizzle.
I understand that the content and shape of both the fissile material and the chemical explosive charges degrade and must be maintained rigorously. Such maintenance is virtually impossible without a full state-sponsored nuclear lab.
We got problems, no doubt, but Russian Suitcase Nukes are probably not worth losing sleep over. I would worry about the Iranians.
Not only that, but they would show up like a lighted flare on the radiation monitors now installed nearly everywhere. Nukes are the least of our worries.
Not to be a wide eye paranoid nutter. But...it could be a possible explanation that they bought "fizzled" ones on the black market, and have just now gotten the support from Iran/N.Korea/China/France to rebuild them. Then the timing is about right.
I'm not losing sleep over this however.
To set the record straight about suitcase nukes....they are great against one small building or structure. For example...if you wanted to topple the statue of liberty...it would probably do the job. If you used it on the pentagon...it would barely blow up one end of the building. They aren't exactly the weapon of choice for massive damage. And as the maintenance of these...most...if not all...of them...were made in the 1970s. I doubt that anyone has performed maintenance on them since the mid-90s...so the chance of them working might be fairly questionable.
We got problems, no doubt, but Russian Suitcase Nukes are probably not worth losing sleep over. I would worry about the Iranians.
I would also worry about the Pakistanis who seem to have a track record of assisting others with nuclear technology, i.e., Iran, Libya, and North Korea. Based on personal experience, I have found the Paks to be the most devout and radical Islamicists in the world. They have the knowledge and fissile material to assist AQ in maintaining or rejuvenating suitcase nukes.