Pakistan Nuclear Proliferation - 02 October 2004

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JE Menon
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Post by JE Menon »

One of the most important things for the US to do would be to reassure the theocrats in Tehran that it has no intention of forcing "regime change", or any other change which might challenge the theocracy - such as a recognition of Israel. It must, however, make clear that it expects Iran to stay on the democratic path that it has embarked on - far more convincingly than other countries that the US is currently dealing with.

On Iran's part, it would have to clarify that it has no intentions of violating the NPT which it has signed, and also - minus the rhetoric that is often the consequence of electioneering - it has no intention of actually doing anything to set back any developments on the peace front in the Mideast.

A US-Iran rapprochment is win-win on all counts for both sides. I believe it is also inevitable, and the question is whether there should be any bloodshed before that. There needn't be.
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Post by karthik.k »

KGoan,
Saar please send me the mail too. karthik [dot] k [at] extremix [dot] net.

There seems to be considerable evidence that Iran if left alone will come out of theocracy. But what of the Revolutionary Guards. How can the world be sure that there will be no anti-zionist nutcases amongst those tasked to guard the nukes ?

I am mostly interested in the opinions and the reasons behind them. My position does not automatically translate to support for pre-emption by Israel or US.
/kk
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Post by kgoan »

Rye, Karthik

Check your emails guys.
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Post by VikramS »

Purely from a strategic point of view, there is absolutely no reason for India to encourage a Nuclear Iran. The geo-political situation in the Middle-East is unstable and there is no guarantee that a WMD will not fall in a not so sane hand.

The current Indian policy of constructive engagement within flexible parameters defined in terms of our mutual interests is the right track. There is no major disagreement which is a thorn in our relatoins. I feel that both Iran and India understand each other's compulsions and constraints, and are willing to shake hands within the boundaries defined by them.

This is very different from TSP's arrangement with Uncle. During the 90s there was a continous wail from TSP of Uncle dumping them after the Cold War was over. It seems TSPians felt that Uncle will sugar-daddy them forever.
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Post by Rye »

Kgoan,

Got it. Thanks!
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Post by karthik.k »

KGoan,
Thank you very much
/kk
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Post by Rangudu »

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=express& ... rong110904
Khan Man?

by David Armstrong
Post date: 11.09.04

Since September 11, 2001, President Bush has consistently touted his
administration's determination to prevent the spread of weapons of
mass destruction to terrorists and regimes that sponsor them. As
evidence of progress, in his first debate with John Kerry, the
president proclaimed that the nuclear smuggling ring headed by
Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan had been "brought to justice." In truth,
however, nothing of the kind has occurred. More than ten months after
the public exposure of Khan's proliferation network, no one involved
has been prosecuted. Khan himself received a full pardon from
Musharraf. The Bush administration responded not by imposing sanctions
on Pakistan but by praising Musharraf's government for its "serious
efforts" to "end the activities of a dangerous network."

Now it turns out that Pakistan's new envoy to Washington may have
sanctioned his proliferation. In late September, Islamabad announced
the appointment of former Pakistani military chief General Jehangir
Karamat as its ambassador-designate to the United States. Karamat, who
is a close friend of Musharraf, served as head of Pakistan's armed
forces from 1996 to 1998. Last February, following exposure of his
black-market network, Khan told Pakistani investigators that he traded
in nuclear technology with the full knowledge of top military
officials, including Karamat, Karamat's predecessor as army chief, and
Musharraf, who succeeded Karamat in that post.

Khan made the allegations in an eleven-page signed statement in which
he confessed to selling atomic secrets beginning in 1988. A senior
Pakistani military official told reporters in early February that Khan
had named Karamat and retired General Mirza Aslam Beg, who headed
Pakistan's army from 1988 to 1991, as authorizing the sales. According
to the official, Khan's statement accused Karamat and Beg of
"indirectly instructing" him to make the transfers. The official said
Khan told investigators he had acted on instructions Karamat and Beg
passed through two middlemen--one a military advisor to former Prime
Minister Benazir Bhutto and the other a friend of Bhutto's. Moreover,
a friend of Khan's told reporters in February that the scientist had
recently informed him that Karamat, Musharraf, and Beg were "aware of
everything" he had done. (In response to questions from The New
Republic, Karamat flatly denied Khan's assertions.)

Yet in debriefings by investigators, Khan reportedly asserted that
Karamat was immersed in the details of an arrangement in which
Pakistan received help with its ballistic missile program in exchange
for providing North Korea with uranium enrichment technology. During
his tenure as army chief of staff, Karamat held overall responsibility
for Pakistan's Ghauri mid-range missile program. In December 1997, he
reportedly made a secret trip to North Korea. Four months later, in
April 1998, he officiated at the first successful test of the Ghauri,
widely believed to be a rechristened North Korean Nodong missile.
"What Khan is implying is that there was a quid pro quo and that
Karamat was aware of what was going on," says Gaurav Kampani, a senior research associate at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in
Monterey, California. "[Khan] is suggesting that [Karamat] presided
over the nuclear-for-missile transfer or actually signed off on it."
Karamat insisted to The New Republic he did not travel to North Korea
and was not aware of or involved in an exchange of missiles for
nuclear technology.

Those who know Karamat describe him as a levelheaded, sober
individual. Stephen Cohen, director of the South Asia Project at the
Brookings Institution where Karamat was a visiting fellow in 2000,
says Karamat is one of the most "sensible" and "reflective" officers
the Pakistani military has produced. "I have great respect for him,"
Cohen said. "He's a very thoughtful guy. ... I think he's a very
decent person." Yet Cohen and other close observers of Pakistani
affairs agree there may be substance to A.Q. Khan's assertions. "There
is no way Khan could have done what he did without at least the
acquiescence of the Pakistani military establishment, [of which
Karamat was a part]," says Ashley Tellis, a senior associate at the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who studies South Asia.

All this puts the United States in an extremely awkward position.
Having embraced Pakistan as an essential ally in the war on terror,
the Bush administration is loath to risk a rupture over the issue of
proliferation. As a result, says Tellis, "The U.S. has essentially
acquiesced to the Pakistani government's position on this matter." The
upshot is that even as the administration proclaims its commitment to
halting the spread of weapons of mass destruction, it finds itself
unable to meaningfully address the most dangerous proliferation crisis
in history.

Karamat is a case in point. Washington's response to his nomination as
ambassador has been muted. The administration accepted his appointment
shortly after it was announced. The general is expected to present his
credentials to President Bush and take up his new post shortly. Asked
to comment on A.Q. Khan's allegations concerning Karamat, the State
Department declined.

Yet if Khan is telling the truth, then the Bush administration needs
to take a good hard look at those he implicated, including Karamat and
Musharraf, and determine whether it is in this country's interest to
remain in bed with them. Until there is a full investigation of the
Khan affair, it will be impossible to know which of the scientist's
nuclear deals were approved by Pakistani officials, or even whether
the nuclear network has been shut down. A truly independent
investigation would require free and unfettered access to Khan and his
cohorts, something Musharraf has so far refused to allow. In fact, on
the very day Bush declared that Khan had been "brought to justice,"
the International Atomic Energy Agency announced that it had been
barred from interviewing the master proliferator.

In early October, during their second presidential debate, both Kerry
and Bush cited nuclear proliferation as the single greatest threat to
American security. Vice President Dick Cheney has said repeatedly that
he is worried about a terrorist nuclear attack within the United
States. Yet the Bush administration seems incapable of matching its
professed concerns with action when it comes to Pakistan. Doing so
would require that the administration confront the ugly reality that
its chosen partner in the war on terror is also the source of the
greatest danger facing this country. That apparently is a choice
President Bush and company are unwilling, or unable, to make. Until
they do, the United States--and the world--will live in the shadow of
a potential nuclear nightmare.
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Post by arun »

German suspected of helping Libyan nuclear program arrested in Switzerland

Updated at 8:15 on November 16, 2004, EST.

BERLIN (AP) - A 61-year-old German engineer has been arrested in Switzerland on an international warrant on suspicion that he helped Libya's past efforts to build a nuclear bomb, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.

The engineer, identified as Gotthard L., was arrested Nov. 13 by Swiss police in the canton of St. Gallen on suspicion that he helped in develop a gas centrifuge to enrich uranium for use in atomic weapons for a payoff worth $4 million to $5 million Cdn, prosecutors' spokeswoman Frauke Scheuten said in a statement.

His full identity was not released, but the name of a German living in Switzerland, Gotthard Lerch, has previously emerged through investigations by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The arrest comes as part of an investigation to uncover the secret network of Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani nuclear scientist who admitted in February that he passed nuclear technology to other countries.

In August, German authorities arrested Gerhard Wisser, whom they described at the time as the main suspect in the case. He was released on bail but re-arrested in South Africa in September.

Swiss authorities raided the home of Gotthard L. at the same time but did not arrest him, saying his alleged role in the network was still being examined.

Last month, German authorities arrested Swiss engineer Urs Tinner, 39, on allegations he was also a member of the ring.

The three are accused of being part of a plan to deliver centrifuge parts made by a company in South Africa to Libya between 2001 and 2003 at the request of Buhary Seyed Abu Tahir, a Sri Lankan who prosecutors said was a middleman between the network and Libya.

The parts were shipped to Dubai and loaded onto a German-registered freighter with false customs papers, headed for Libya, but are not believed to have made it to their destination, prosecutors said.

The investigation has been extended beyond the three to "others," prosecutors said without elaborating.

The IAEA said in January that Pakistani scientists were involved in selling technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

Islamabad detained several scientists, including Khan, the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb. A national hero for giving Pakistan the bomb, he admitted to the charges but was pardoned by President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi renounced his banned weapons programs in December in a dramatic turnaround meant to help rebuild relations with the West.

The European Union last month ended 12 years of sanctions against Libya and eased an arms embargo and the United States lifted most of its commercial sanctions in April after Gadhafi abandoned his weapons programs.
URL
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Post by jrjrao »

Pakistan's PhotoChor Khan Gave Iran Bomb-Grade Uranium -Exiles
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=259250
VIENNA (Reuters) - Iran obtained weapons-grade uranium and a design for a nuclear bomb from a Pakistani scientist who has admitted to selling nuclear secrets abroad, an exiled Iranian opposition group said on Wednesday.

The group, that has given accurate information before, also said Iran is secretly enriching uranium at a military site previously unknown to the U.N., despite promising France, Britain and Germany that it would halt all such work.

"(Abdul Qadeer) Khan gave Iran a quantity of HEU (highly enriched uranium) in 2001, so they already have some," Farid Soleiman, a senior spokesman for the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told reporters.
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Post by Vivek_A »

same report, from the khaleej times..wonder how the saudis feel about iran getting closer to a nuke thanks to TSP..

Pakistani scientist gave Iran highly enriched uranium in 2001
ramana
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Post by ramana »

Thanks Vivek_A. I t confirms my suspicons of what did AQK really proliferate- it is the design and materials of the weapon tested in Chagai on May 28th, 1998. That way the proliferee does not need to test again as he is using a tested assembly.

KSA might have provided the intial funding but TSP is playing for bigger ummah picture. The fact that AQK did this in 2001 is very significant. After 911 and the Operation Parakram mobilization on their Eastern borders. It might be an act of defiance of the US.
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Post by Rangudu »

Ramana,

May 28 or 30?
Umrao
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Post by Umrao »

KSA might already have atleast 4 to 6 ready to go on silk worm etc.
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Post by ramana »

May 28 was HEU weapon from China. May 30 was PU from China for the NoDong/Ghauri. The samples are for HEU not Pu. QED.

Umrao jaan, The KSA ones are on the Chinese origin CSS2 IRBMs not on Silkworms which are not up to snuff and need lightweight Pu design.
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Post by SaiK »

X.POST:
Manu wrote:http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=259867

Iran Got Warhead Design, Bomb-Grade Uranium -Exiles

Nov 17, 2004 — By Louis Charbonneau

VIENNA (Reuters) - Iran obtained weapons-grade uranium and a nuclear bomb design from a Pakistani scientist who has admitted to selling nuclear secrets abroad, an exiled Iranian opposition group said on Wednesday.

The group, which has given accurate information before, also said Iran is secretly enriching uranium at a military site previously unknown to the United Nations, despite promising France, Britain and Germany that it would halt all such work.

"(Abdul Qadeer) Khan gave Iran a quantity of HEU (highly enriched uranium) in 2001, so they already have some," Farid Soleiman, a senior spokesman for the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told reporters.

"I would doubt it was given enough for a weapon," he added.

Soleiman said Khan, who ran a global nuclear black market until it was shut down earlier this year, also gave Iran a Chinese-developed warhead design sometime between 1994 and 1996.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has said Khan's network gave Libya the bomb design and is trying to find out whether Iran got it too. There is no proof it did.

A Pakistani military spokesman did not comment: "We are not responding to every allegation that comes through the media." (Uncle will take care of his MuNNA)

"If true, it's significant," an EU diplomat said.

IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said the IAEA followed up "every solid lead." That will not be easy, because the U.N. agency has been denied access to Khan, who is under house arrest in Pakistan.

Diplomats in Vienna say the NCRI has been the best source of information on Tehran's undeclared nuclear program.

Washington also accuses Iran of secretly developing atomic weapons. Tehran denies the charge.

The NCRI is listed by Washington as a terrorist group. The EU has promised to do the same under its nuclear deal with Iran.

The group established its reputation as a whistleblower in August 2002 when it revealed an undeclared enrichment plant at Natanz and another site at Arak. It has revealed other sites.

IRAN ENRICHING URANIUM "AS WE SPEAK"

The NCRI said Iran was enriching uranium, purifying it for use for fuel or bombs, at a site in northeastern Tehran under a covert arms program.

"It continues to enrich uranium as we speak," Soleiman said. He said the site had an unknown number of centrifuges, which purify uranium by spinning at supersonic speeds.

"There are more sites involving uranium enrichment in Iran," he said, adding their locations needed verification.

Soleiman said Iran wanted a bomb by the middle of next year. Israel estimates Iran will be "nuclear capable" in 2007.

Iran promised the European Union on Sunday to freeze its enrichment program, sparing it a referral to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions and opening the door to political and economic "carrots" France, Britain and Germany are offering.

Soleiman said the enrichment site, called the Center for the Development of Advanced Defense Technology, was run by the Defense Ministry and located in Lavizan, near where the United States suspects Iran conducted secret nuclear work before demolishing all the buildings and carting off the rubble.

Soleiman said equipment from Lavizan was moved to the new enrichment site to hide it. He said the NCRI sent the IAEA a letter about the 60-acre top-secret site a few days ago.

The IAEA said in a new report on its two-year investigation of Iran's nuclear program that Iran had not diverted declared nuclear materials to a weapons program, but did not rule out that secret atomic activities existed. (Additional reporting by Islamabad bureau)

Copyright 2004 Reuters News Service. All rights reserved.
SaiK
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Post by SaiK »

INCREMENT THE COUNTER:

- LYBIA
- NORTH KOREA
- IRAN


SOON TO A THEATER NEAR YOU:
- BURMA
- BANGLA DESH
- SAUDI
- INDONESIA

WITH A GRANDE FINALE: CUBA!..

thats when uncle will go "OH! FK!" .. and we can say: "HANG ON DUDE!". there are more theaters arround your corner.
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Post by Arun_S »

http://www.spacewar.com/2004/041117153353.5946zvl6.html

Pakistan denies its scientist transferred enriched uranium to Iran

ISLAMABAD (AFP) Nov 17, 2004
Pakistan Wednesday denied an Iranian opposition claim that its disgraced chief nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan had transferred highly enriched uranium to Tehran in 2001.
"This is a highly exaggerated account. Somebody has let his imagination run wild," a senior government official told AFP, commenting on the statement in Vienna by an Iranian opposition group, National Council for Resistance in Iran.

The group's senior official, Farid Soleimani, claimed at a news conference that Khan "delivered a quantity of HEU to Iran in 2001."

The Pakistani official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Islamabad had shared the findings of its investigation into the international black market of nuclear proliferation with the international community.

"The government of Pakistan had shared findings of some illicit transfers by international blackmarketeers transparently with the people of Pakistan," the official said.

"It has also been cooperating with the IAEA."

Foreign ministry spokesman Masood Khan also dismissed the group's statement as "speculative claims made by individuals."

"Such a communication has to come formally either from the Iranian government or the IAEA before we can comment on it or look into it," Khan told

He said investigations in Pakistan were continuing, but that Islamabad had received no such information either from the Iranian government or the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Pakistan has refused to let the UN atomic agency directly interview Khan, considered the father of Pakistan's bomb, after his public confession in February to selling nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

President Pervez Musharraf gave Khan a conditional pardon and said no government or military body was involved in the proliferation scandal.
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Post by SaiK »

everyone knows pakistanis are a bunch of liers. day is not too far, that an underground nuke explosion happens somewhere along iran/pak border so that either side can take advantage of it. the richter scale of non-proliferation chairs could be more un-seating for american than anyone else.

i wonder if such a thing should happen, india should keep quite in assuming that its entirely not pakistani weapons being tested again and again where ever they proliferate. we should downsize, rightsize our testing thresholds, so that we get a chance to modifiy, recitify, and correct our own designs. :twisted:
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Post by SaiK »

Listen to Neal Conan

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=1567567

real player: npr3156.smil
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Post by Rangudu »

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20041129 ... rong112904
PAKISTAN'S SHADY NEW AMBASSADOR.

Friend Like This

by David Armstrong

Post date 11.18.04 | Issue date 11.29.04

David Armstrong is a reporter with the National Security News Service. NSN?! :lol:

Since September 11, 2001, President Bush has consistently touted his administration's determination to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction to terrorists and regimes that sponsor them. As evi- dence of progress, in his first debate with John Kerry, the president proclaimed that the nuclear smuggling ring headed by Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan had been "brought to justice." In truth, nothing of the kind has taken place. More than ten months after the public exposure of Khan's proliferation network, no one involved has been prosecuted. Khan himself received a full pardon from Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. The Bush administration responded not by imposing sanctions on Pakistan, but by praising Musharraf's government for its "serious efforts to end the activities of a dangerous network."

But Pakistan is hardly serious. It turns out that Pakistan's new envoy to Washington may have sanctioned Khan's dealings. Islamabad recently announced the appointment of a former Pakistani military chief, General Jehangir Karamat, as its ambassador-designate to the United States. Karamat, who is a close friend of Musharraf, served as head of Paki- stan's armed forces from 1996 to 1998. Last February, following exposure of his black-market network, Khan told Pakistani investigators that he traded in nuclear technology with the full knowledge of top military officials--including Karamat.

Khan made the allegations in an eleven-page signed statement in which he confessed to selling atomic secrets beginning in 1988. A senior Pakistani military official told reporters in early February that Khan named Karamat and retired General Mirza Aslam Beg, who headed Pakistan's army from 1988 to 1991, as authorizing the sales. According to the official, Khan's statement accused Karamat and Beg of "indirectly instructing" him to make the transfers. Indeed, the official said Khan told investigators he acted on instructions that Karamat and Beg had passed through two middlemen--a military adviser to former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and a friend of Bhutto's. Moreover, a friend of Khan's told reporters in February that the scientist had recently informed him that Karamat, Beg, and Musharraf, who succeeded Karamat as army chief, were "aware of everything" he had done. (In response to questions from The New Republic, Karamat flatly denied Khan's assertions.)

In debriefings by investigators, Khan reportedly stated that Karamat was immersed in the details of an arrangement in which Pakistan received help with its ballistic missile program in exchange for providing North Korea with uranium-enrichment technology. This makes sense: During his tenure as army chief of staff, Karamat held overall responsibility for Pakistan's Ghauri mid-range missile program. And, in December 1997, Karamat reportedly made a secret trip to North Korea. Four months later, in April 1998, he officiated at the first successful test of the Ghauri, widely believed to be a rechristened North Korean Nodong missile. "What Khan is implying is that there was a quid pro quo and that Karamat was aware of what was going on," says Gaurav Kampani, a senior research associate at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, California. "[Khan] is suggesting that [Karamat] presided over the nuclear-for-missile transfer or actually signed off on it." (Karamat insisted to tnr that he did not travel to North Korea and was not aware of or involved in an exchange of missiles for nuclear technology.)

Those who know Karamat describe him as a level- headed individual. Stephen Cohen, director of the India- South Asia Project at the Brookings Institution, where Karamat was a visiting fellow in 2000, says Karamat is one of the most "sensible" and "reflective" officers the Pakistani military has produced. Yet Cohen and other close observers of Pakistani affairs agree there may be substance to Khan's assertions. "There is no way Khan could have done what he did without at least the acquiescence of the Pakistani military establishment [of which Karamat was a part]," says Ashley Tellis, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who studies South Asia. As for Karamat's possible knowledge of Khan's activities, Cohen says that, although he never took the matter up with the former general, "I would assume that, as army chief of staff, he would have known a lot."

The Khan scandal caught the United States in an extremely awkward position. Having embraced Pakistan as an essential ally in the war on terrorism, the Bush administration is loath to risk a rupture over the issue of proliferation. As a result, says Tellis, "The U.S. has essentially acquiesced to the Pakistani government's position on this matter." The upshot is that, even as the administration proclaims its commitment to halting the spread of weapons of mass destruction, it finds itself unable to meaningfully address the most dangerous proliferation crisis in history.

Karamat is a case in point. Washington's response to his nomination as ambassador has been muted. The Bush administration accepted his appointment shortly after it was announced. The general is expected to present his credentials to Bush and take up his new post soon. The State Department declined to comment on Khan's allegations concerning Karamat.

Until there is a full investigation of the Khan affair, it will be impossible to know which, if any, of the scientist's nuclear deals were approved by Pakistani officials, or even whether the nuclear network has been completely shut down. A truly independent investigation would require free and unfettered access to Khan and his cohorts, something Musharraf has so far refused to allow. In fact, on the very day Bush declared that Khan had been "brought to justice," the International Atomic Energy Agency announced that it had been barred from interviewing the master proliferator.

Despite this, the Bush administration has accepted Paki- stan's assertions that no political or military leaders, including Karamat or Musharraf, were involved in Khan's dealings. It would, of course, be difficult to sanction Pakistan at this point in the war on terrorism. Yet, by accepting Karamat's nomination without an independent inquiry into Khan's allegations, the Bush administration is turning a blind eye to Pakistan's cover-up of the proliferation scandal.

In late September, during their first presidential debate, both Bush and John Kerry cited nuclear proliferation as the single greatest threat to U.S. security. Vice President Dick Cheney has said repeatedly that he is kept up nights by fears of a nuclear terrorist attack within the United States. Yet the Bush administration seems incapable of matching its professed concerns with action when it comes to Pakistan. Doing so would require that the administration confront the ugly reality that its chosen partner in the war on terrorism is also the source of the greatest danger facing this country. That, apparently, is a choice Bush and company are unwilling, or unable, to make. Until they do, the United States--and the world--will live in the shadow of a potential nuclear nightmare.
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Post by SaiK »

anybody heard how foggy bottom views pakistan - read neal conan's lips. when harpreet [the caller] condemns pakistan is a rogue nation, immediately he swooped in to say no way! this is an extreme notion. get it!? we would be wasting bandwidth in fighting a case to make pakistan a terrorist nation under any nuclear proliferation flagship of pakistani anti-terrorism ally.

we need to move on to corner this paki proliferation in a different angle. perhaps help them to proliferate more would be a good idea till things are seen as it should be seen. hey, we were the ones who vindicated their stand and exposed those nukes in chagai. lets do it again, in a different way.

i don't know, how, lets think.
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Post by Rangudu »

http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/2 ... -9823r.htm
A.Q. Khan holds key to Iran's nuclear vault

By Anwar Iqbal

UPI South Asian Affairs Analyst

Published 11/19/2004 5:51 PM

WASHINGTON, Nov. 19 (UPI) -- Anti-nuclear lobbyists are urging the Bush administration to use its influence on Pakistan to allow international experts to interrogate disgraced Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan.

Khan, who is still regarded as a national hero for founding Pakistan's nuclear program, has been under house arrest since February when he admitted to selling nuclear secrets and technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

The most powerful appeal to the U.S. administration to demand direct access to Khan was made Thursday at a briefing on Capitol Hill where anti-nuclear lobbyists said the world would never know the truth about Iran's nuclear program until Khan is questioned by international experts.

Iran continues to claim that it is not developing nuclear weapons, but earlier this week U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told reporters that intelligence indicates Iran is trying to modify its missiles to carry nuclear warheads. He did not elaborate.

Meanwhile, the International Atomic Energy Agency, a U.N. watchdog that oversees proliferation activities across the world, said this week it cannot say for sure whether Iran's nuclear activities are purely peaceful, as Tehran claims, or are designed to develop nuclear weapons.

The IAEA recently circulated a confidential 32-page report about Iran to diplomats on the governing board.

The agency confirmed that Iran is voluntarily suspending all enrichment-related activities, including the manufacture and import of gas centrifuges that could be used to make nuclear bombs.

The IAEA will start verification of the suspension next week.

But Iranian opposition leaders told a news conference in Paris Wednesday they have evidence to prove that Iran has a secret facility for developing nuclear weapons. Later, Iranian officials said the claim by the opposition National Council of Resistance of Iran is a lie.

They said the group is trying to negate the progress Iran recently made with European negotiators by agreeing to suspend uranium enrichment.

Iran last week agreed to suspend uranium enrichment and all linked activities in a deal worked out with Britain, France, Germany and the European Union. The deal, which goes into force on Monday, prohibits Iran from all uranium gas-processing activities, as well as other programs linked to enrichment.

But media reports quoting U.S. and European officials said Iran was exploiting the window until Monday to produce uranium hexafluoride at its plant in the central city of Isfahan.

Iran is not prohibited from making uranium hexafluoride until the deal takes force. But its decision to carry out uranium processing right up to the freeze deadline is interpreted by some anti-nuclear activists as indicative of Iran's efforts to keep the nuclear option.

The Bush administration, which does not trust Iran's claim that it is interested only in low-grade enriched uranium for nuclear power, says Tehran wants to enrich uranium to make weapons.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post reported Thursday Powell's claim that Iran could be developing nuclear-capable missiles was based on intelligence that was classified and came from an "unvetted, single source."

Referring to this confusion, two anti-nuclear activists told a briefing on Capitol Hill Thursday that only Khan, the Pakistani scientist who has confessed to supplying nuclear technology to Iran, knows the truth.

David Albright, a physicist and former arms inspector, and Kenneth Pollack, former CIA analyst, told U.S. lawmakers the IAEA would never learn how close Iran was to making nuclear weapons without interviewing Khan.

The briefing on Iran's nuclear program was attended by lawmakers from both Republican and Democratic parties, besides senior U.S. officials, academics, journalists, diplomats and lobbyists.

Albright, who now heads a Washington-based anti-nuclear group, told the gathering it was unfair to criticize the IAEA for failing to make a complete assessment of Iran's nuclear program.

The Vienna-based U.N. nuclear agency, he said, "still has one major job ahead of it, to interview Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan" about possible transfers of nuclear material to Iran.

"It may be unachievable, but it is very important that the U.S. put pressure on Pakistan to allow this, because you cannot trust the Pakistani government in the end to represent what A.Q. Khan says," said Albright.

"And you have to worry about whether it's complete, and unfortunately, you have to worry about whether it is fully accurate," he added.

Pakistan has denied an Iranian opposition group's allegation that Khan gave Iran enriched uranium and designs for bombs. Pakistan also has informed Washington that it cannot allow foreign officials to interview Khan, who is still considered a national hero in the country despite his confessed involvement in nuclear smuggling.

Khan is under house arrest in Pakistan but Islamabad has allowed the United States to conduct indirect interrogation of the Pakistani scientist. U.S. officials send their questions to Pakistani intelligence officials who question Khan on their behalf and send his answers to their American counterparts.

Both President Bush and Powell have said they are satisfied with Pakistan's cooperation and the information the United States received from Khan allowed it to dismantle the gang that was running an international network of nuclear smugglers.
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Post by Arun_S »

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/FK17Aa02.html

Asia's ticking nuclear time-bomb
By Alan Boyd

SYDNEY - Asia's relentless pursuit of nuclear energy is causing a few sleepless nights for the anti-terrorism community as the security focus shifts from rogue states with regional ambitions to the equally sinister back door of individual opportunism.

A summit of 18 Asia-Pacific security ministers in Sydney late last week was told that few states had safeguards in place to prevent the illicit export of nuclear materials that could be used to make explosive devices or hold countries to ransom.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) even went so far as to label the threat posed by this trade as "a race against time", noting that there had been about 630 confirmed incidents of trafficking in nuclear or other radioactive materials since 1993.

"We need to do all we can to work on the new phenomenon called nuclear terrorism, which was sprung on us after [September 11, 2001] when we realized terrorists had become more sophisticated and had shown an interest in nuclear and radioactive material," IAEA chief Mohammed ElBaradei said at the talks.

For now, the response is stronger on rhetoric than reason, with politicians in Sydney committing their governments to "expand and enhance the nuclear safeguards and security framework", but offering few leads on how these nebulous aims might be achieved.

The United Kingdom, the United States, France and the Soviet Union, the four original nuclear powers, pledged after China's entry into the select club three decades ago to freeze the spread of the technology in Asia as a Cold War buffer.

There was some logic in this approach, given that six of the 14 known nuclear alerts have occurred in the Asia-Pacific region, dating back to the decision by US president Harry S Truman to send atomic weapons to Guam in 1950 for possible use against China.

More recently, forces from Japan, the US and the Soviet Union went on a war footing in 1984 after a rogue officer in the Soviet navy sent an unauthorized message to nuclear-armed vessels approving a strike.

Two confrontations have occurred since 1999 between India and Pakistan that almost resulted in a nuclear exchange; the first was over Kashmir and the second followed an attack by Islamic militants on the Indian parliament.

But although there are still only three declared nuclear powers in Asia - China, Pakistan and India - the region has 100 reactors for research and power generation that some security experts believe pose a potentially bigger challenge due to the physical impossibility of accounting for every atom of radioactive material. According to the World Nuclear Association (WNA), which represents commercial interests in the nuclear field, Asia is the only region in the world where nuclear power is "growing significantly".

Japan, China, India, Pakistan, Taiwan, Indonesia, Thailand, South Korea, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Vietnam all have operational reactors; North Korea has two partially completed reactors, but work has halted because of concerns over their illicit weapons capabilities. There is also a nuclear power plant in the Philippines, but it has been mothballed over litigation concerning bribery and safety deficiencies and is expected eventually to be converted to coal or oil.

Another 20 reactors are under construction and there are plans for a further 40, mostly in China, Japan, South Korea and India. If all proceed, Asia will have 160 reactors within a decade, with only Singapore yet to declare an interest in the technology.

Not surprisingly, it is big oil importers such as Japan and South Korea that have shown the strongest commitment to nuclear energy. The Japanese have 53 operational power plants and 17 research reactors, with three more under construction and 12 planned. Already nuclear energy provides 39% of total electricity generation and the dependency could rise to 50% by 2010 if greenhouse emission targets are met.

South Korea meets 39% of its electricity needs from nuclear power generated at 18 plants and has two more under construction and eight in the planning stages; there are also two research reactors.

China's nuclear industry is still modest, with only eight power units in operation, but is expected by the WNA to expand rapidly as domestic coal and gas reserves dwindle. An additional three plants are under construction, 10 more are planned or proposed, and there are 13 research facilities.

India and Taiwan have 14 and six power plants respectively, with the Indians expected to gain another 13 by the end of the decade. Taiwan, which gets 21% of its power from nuclear units, is building two more plants.

Keeping track of all of these plants has not proved easy, especially as the two countries with the most checkered record on nuclear brinkmanship - India and Pakistan - are not signatories to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the IAEA's main monitoring mechanism.

Of the other countries with reactors, only Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines are full NPT members, though China, Vietnam, Bangladesh and Thailand have acceded to the treaty. North Korea signed an IAEA safeguards treaty in 1992, but withdrew the following year.

The IAEA itself failed to detect the worldwide black market in nuclear technology overseen by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, even while the highest levels of that country's armed forces were aware of his activities.

Critics, including many scientists in the environmental and human-rights movements, have suggested that the IAEA and other watchdog organizations were too complacent on the proliferation risks posed by Asia's blossoming peaceful nuclear-energy programs.

NPT allows the IAEA to keep count of the isotopes at individual plants, but only if it is granted free access to facilities. As shown by the IAEA's flawed success in verifying nuclear stockpiles in Iraq, Iran, Libya and North Korea, this doesn't always happen.

The Khan case also showed how impotent the agency becomes once materials go missing and reach smuggling routes, where they become entangled with mainstream criminal activities.

Researchers with the US-based Strategic Studies Institute (SSI) and a group of security organizations, including the US Central Intelligence Agency, have concluded that plutonium filched from research facilities is passed along the same channels used by gangs that traffic narcotics and human beings.

Furthermore, "the networks that support the terrorist groups in Asia are probably intersecting with the networks that facilitate trade between suppliers and consumers in nuclear-proliferation trade", the agencies reported after a workshop on the effectiveness of the NPT.

"The nuclear-proliferation networks are in place. Shutting down A Q Khan's network in Pakistan did not necessarily eliminate the networks," the report added.

A review of the NPT is scheduled next year, with Asian policymakers variously advocating an extension of its mandate or total abolition. Japan, China and South Korea are among a group of countries that are lukewarm on multilateral solutions for security issues, though they will probably bow to pressure from Washington for a treaty extension.

Most analysts believe the NPT will only work at the anti-terrorism level if it is backed by a political response and a more responsible attitude by the suppliers of nuclear technology, which often ignore pleas for restraint. But as the SSI workshop noted, there has been a "fundamental failure of any state or group of states to emerge as a force to advocate regional solutions to nuclear security risks facing the Asia-Pacific".

"Important components of the international community's non-proliferation strategies - the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), and other dual-use-technology export-control regimes - have failed to stem the trade in nuclear materials and technologies in Asia. There, nuclear suppliers appear willing to satisfy the demands of persistent buyers," the workshop reported.

The UK, the US and Russia, the original three sponsors of the NPT, have all exported nuclear technology to Asia, as has France. However, most of the recent growth has come from within Asia itself, with Pakistan, China, South and North Korea and India all entering the market.

Khan's network was based in a country that has refused to sign the NPT and its main customers - North Korea and Iran - are also outside the treaty. Yet there has been no peer pressure from elsewhere in the region.

One reason for the political lethargy is that there is no consensus on the extent of the threat posed by illicit exports of nuclear material, with much of Asia viewing localized terrorist activities as a more immediate problem.

IAEA chief ElBaradei also acknowledged in his address to the Sydney summit that attempts to regulate the flow of nuclear technology conflict with Asia's free-trade mentality, and governments are reluctant to provide export data.

"The only reasonable conclusion is that the control of technology is not, in itself, a sufficient barrier against further proliferation," he said. "For an increasing number of countries with a highly developed industrial infrastructure - and in some cases access to high-enriched uranium or plutonium - the international community must rely primarily on a continuing sense of security as the basis for the adherence of these countries to their non-proliferation commitments. And security perceptions can rapidly change."
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Post by Neshant »

> Khan's network was based in a country that has refused to sign the NPT
> and its main customers - North Korea and Iran - are also outside the
> treaty.

The guy is wrong. Eyeran is in the NPT. NK was but it left.
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Post by Calvin »

This is Iran's trump card:
Article X
1. Each Party shall in exercising its national sovereignty have the right to withdraw from the Treaty if it decides that extraordinary events, related to the subject matter of this Treaty, have jeopardized the supreme interests of its country. It shall give notice of such withdrawal to all other Parties to the Treaty and to the United Nations Security Council three months in advance. Such notice shall include a statement of the extraordinary events it regards as having jeopardized its supreme interests.
SaiK
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Post by SaiK »

there is good way to make sure all these fundementalist nuclear proliferations of pakistan and other countries npt or non-npt members are nuked. if america and other advanced rich nuclear powers starts say providing nuclear power to the people of these nations at a reasonable costs by constructing nuclear power stations all controlled by them, so that it does not violate rules set by themselves.

common man does not suffer - sheiks and industrialists and other capital criminals will though.

huh!
Leonard
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PUKI Nookes ...

Post by Leonard »

The seizure of nuke facilities

A.G. NOORANI



GEORGE FRIEDMAN, who set up Stratfor, a private intelligence agency, in 1996, would have us believe that: "In late December, when it appeared that India might launch a nuclear strike at Pakistan, Pakistan was facing a nuclear threat from two directions. When U.S. official went to mediate the crisis, it was also to deliver this message to [Pakistan President Pervez] Musharraf: `Unless U.S. observers, to put it politely were given access to Pakistani facilities in order to guarantee that nuclear materials were not being taken out by nuclear scientists and technicians close to the ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence], the U.S. would have to take steps to destroy those facilities, steps that would, if no other way was available, include nuclear strikes.' But the U.S. did not want to deal with the Pakistan issue in isolation. It had much more ambitious plans.

"In the midst of the nuclear crisis with India, the United States created another nuclear crisis for Pakistan. Unless they were able to place observers on Pakistani nuclear sites, which meant taking over those sites, the United States would not only remove any restraints that India felt but would also feel free to strike if necessary. Pakistan faced a nuclear nightmare from a completely unexpected source. The United States wanted control of Pakistan's nuclear capability, and it wasn't bluffing. It wanted that control quickly...

"However at a point in March 2002, U.S. forces (not in uniform)... along with scientists... deployed simultaneously to all of Pakistan's nuclear reactors. They rushed to take inventory of what was there and examine records of what ought to be there. The records were scarce. No conclusion could be drawn, but the technology found indicated that Pakistan was certainly in no condition to deliver a small nuclear device to Al Qaeda, given U.S. monitoring of their facilities. Also found were advanced Chinese plans for other devices that had not yet been built but which would have made Pakistan much more dangerous by increasing the reliability and sophistication of its weapons.

"The United States had secured Pakistan's nuclear facilities, although it was only nominally observing them. Musharraf worked with the United States to keep this secret."

http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2124/st ... 408000.htm
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Post by Vivek_A »

30 billion/yr for intelligence and 0$/yr for common sense....

C.I.A. Says Pakistanis Gave Iran Nuclear Aid

WASHINGTON, Nov. 23 - A new report from the Central Intelligence Agency says the arms trafficking network led by the Pakistani scientist A. Q. Khan provided Iran's nuclear program with "significant assistance," including the designs for "advanced and efficient" weapons components.

The unclassified version of the report, posted Tuesday on the agency's Web site, www.cia.gov, does not say explicitly whether Mr. Khan's network sold Iran complete plans for building a warhead, as the network is known to have done for Libya and perhaps North Korea. But it suggests that American intelligence agencies now believe that the bomb-making designs provided by the network to Iran in the 1990's were more significant than the United States government has previously disclosed.

In a recent closed-door speech to a private group, George J. Tenet, the former director of central intelligence, described Mr. Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, as being "at least as dangerous as Osama bin Laden" because of his role in providing nuclear technology to other countries. A tape recording of the speech was obtained by The New York Times.

Until now, in discussing Iran's nuclear program, American officials have referred publicly only to the Khan network's role in supplying designs for older Pakistani centrifuges used to enrich uranium. But American officials have also suspected that the Khan network provided Iran with a warhead design as well.

The C.I.A. report is the first to assert that the designs provided to Iran also included those for weapons "components."

The report to Congress is an annual update, required by law, on countries' acquisition of illicit weapons technology. The posting of the unclassified version on the agency's Web site comes two days before a meeting in Vienna of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations' nuclear monitoring group, is scheduled to review the status of Iran's weapons program.

The "Report to Congress on the Acquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced Conventional Munitions" is the first to be issued by the agency since November. Its focus is the six-month period from July to December 2003, but it also discusses broader trends.

It does not mention what Secretary of State Colin L. Powell described last week as new intelligence about Iran's nuclear program, linking the country's missile program to its effort to find a way to deliver atomic weapons.

The report says the agency remains convinced that the Iran is pursuing a clandestine weapons program, despite claims to the contrary by the Tehran government. It says Iran's stated willingness to allow inspections by the I.A.E.A. is likely to prevent Tehran from using its declared nuclear sites to produce weapons, but warns that it might use covert facilities for those purposes.

The warhead design provided to Libya by the Khan network was for an aging, crude Chinese model. Such a design would nevertheless provide Iran with important assistance in what American officials say is its quest to develop nuclear weapons, a goal they say Tehran could reach in the next several years.

The C.I.A. began to infiltrate Mr. Khan's network in the late 1990's, according to the account Mr. Tenet is now spelling out in his speeches. That operation led to the unraveling of the network's ties to Libya and the unmasking last year of Libya's illicit weapons program.

Mr. Khan remains in Pakistan, where he was pardoned last year by President Pervez Musharraf. Libya turned over the design to the United States early this year, and it is now being examined at the Department of Energy, the custodian of the American nuclear arsenal.

But American intelligence agencies are still pursuing questions about the extent of the role the Khan network played in providing assistance to North Korea, Iran and perhaps other customers. A recent report by the I.A.E.A. noted "several common elements" between Iran's nuclear program and Libya's, which is being dismantled.

Mr. Khan directed Pakistan's uranium enrichment program for 25 years. His role as an illicit supplier of nuclear technology had been widely rumored, but was made public only late last year, when the United States and Britain reached an agreement with Libya that made public the extent of the Libyan weapons program.

In recent paid speeches, Mr. Tenet has given new details about the C.I.A.'s role in unraveling the Khan network, according to people who attended the sessions. The speeches to private groups have been delivered on ground rules that they remain off the record, but a tape recording of a speech given in Georgia in September was provided to The Times by someone who was there.

In that speech, Mr. Tenet said that the C.I.A.'s role had stretched back to 1997, and that he had kept it secret in the government from everyone but President Bill Clinton and President Bush. Describing a "hidden network that stretched across three continents," he said: "Working with British colleagues, we pieced together his subsidiaries, his clients, his front companies, his finances and manufacturing plants. We were inside his residence, inside his facilities, inside his rooms. We were everywhere these people were."

Mr. Tenet called the agency's role "one of the greatest success stories nobody ever talks about."

A classified version of the C.I.A. report has been provided to Congressional intelligence committees, administration officials said. The unclassified version refers only obliquely to several delicate subjects, including what American officials believe has been North Korea's recent success in building as many as a half-dozen additional nuclear weapons from plutonium extracted from spent fuel rods.

The document restates longstanding concerns that outside experts, including a Pakistani nuclear engineer, may have provided assistance to Al Qaeda as part of its quest to acquire nuclear weapons. "One of our highest concerns is Al Qaeda's stated readiness to attempt unconventional attacks against us," the report says.
Vivek_A
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Post by Vivek_A »

Your tax $$ at work....

Unclassified Report to Congress
on the Acquisition of Technology
Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction
and Advanced Conventional Munitions,


Iran continued to vigorously pursue indigenous programs to produce nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. Iran is also working to improve delivery systems as well as ACW. To this end, Iran continued to seek foreign materials, training, equipment, and know-how. During the reporting period, Iran still focused particularly on entities in Russia, China, North Korea, and Europe. Iran's nuclear program received significant assistance in the past from the proliferation network headed by Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan.

Iran continues to use its civilian nuclear energy program to justify its efforts to establish domestically or otherwise acquire the entire nuclear fuel cycle. Iran claims that this fuel cycle would be used to produce fuel for nuclear power reactors, such as the 1,000-megawatt light-water reactor that Russia is continuing to build at the southern port city of Bushehr. However, Iran does not need to produce its own fuel for this reactor because Russia has pledged to provide the fuel throughout the operating lifetime of the reactor and is negotiating with Iran to take back the irradiated spent fuel. An Iranian opposition group, beginning in August of 2002, revealed several previously undisclosed Iranian nuclear facilities, sparking numerous IAEA inspections since February 2003. Subsequent reports by the IAEA Director General revealed numerous failures by Iran to disclose facilities and activities, which run contrary to its IAEA safeguards obligations. Before the reporting period, the A. Q. Khan network provided Iran with designs for Pakistan's older centrifuges, as well as designs for more advanced and efficient models, and components.

Usama Bin Ladin and other al-Qa'ida leaders have stated that al-Qa'ida has a religious duty to acquire nuclear weapons. Documents recovered in Afghanistan during Operation Enduring Freedom show that al-Qa'ida was engaged in rudimentary nuclear research, although the extent of its indigenous program is unclear. Outside experts, such as Pakistani nuclear engineer Bashir al-Din Mahmood may have provided some assistance to al-Qa'ida's program. Bashir, who reportedly met with Bin Ladin, discussed information concerning nuclear weapons. Al-Qa'ida has been seeking nuclear material since the early 1990s, according to the testimony of a government witness-Jamal Ahmad Fadl-during the 2001 trail on the al-Qa'ida bombings of the American Embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. Fadl claimed that al-Qa'ida pursued the sale of what they believed was enriched uranium in Sudan in the early 1990s. This effort may have been a "scam" operation, and there is no credible evidence al-Qa'ida actually acquired the uranium. Al-Qa'ida has been the victim of other nuclear "scams" in the past, but it probably has become sensitized to such operations in recent years, in part due to media coverage of nuclear smuggling and scam operations.
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Post by Rangudu »

New Branch Found in Nuclear Network
South African affiliates of a Pakistani scientist's proliferation ring tried to outfit Libya with an off-the-shelf uranium enrichment plant.
By Douglas Frantz and William C. Rempel
Times Staff Writers

November 28, 2004

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Authorities pursuing traffickers in nuclear weapons technology recently uncovered an audacious scheme to deliver a complete uranium enrichment plant to Libya, documents and interviews show.

The discovery provides fresh evidence of the reach and sophistication of Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan's global black market in nuclear know-how and equipment. It also exposes a previously undetected South African branch of the Khan network.

The startling dimensions of the plot began to emerge in September, when police raided a factory outside Johannesburg. They found the elements of a two-story steel processing system for the enrichment plant, packed in 11 freight containers for shipment to Libya.

South African officials have disclosed only that they discovered nuclear components. The Times has learned that the massive system was designed to operate an array of 1,000 centrifuges for enriching uranium.

Once assembled in Libya, the plant could have produced enough weapons-grade uranium to manufacture several nuclear bombs a year. Delivery of the plant would have greatly accelerated Libya's efforts to develop nuclear weapons.

Khan already had secretly shipped to Libya a supply of processed uranium fuel for the enrichment plant, according to later reports by international inspectors.

And some of the centrifuges for the plant were shipped separately from Malaysia. The interception of that cargo by U.S. and Italian authorities in October 2003 led to the Johannesburg raid and spurred Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi to renounce efforts to develop banned weapons.

In the Sept. 1 raid, police found a videotape that detailed the inner workings of Khan's top-secret government enrichment laboratory in Pakistan, along with trunks filled with designs from the lab.

The discovery of a South African connection to Khan's web has led to the arrests of four business and engineering figures, including some who had been involved in the former apartheid regime's nuclear program.

Leads developed in the inquiry have opened up new avenues for investigators from South Africa, other countries and the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency, who are tracing the network's operations on three continents.

The questions confronting investigators include whether other countries sought Khan's help and whether tougher restrictions are necessary to prevent a repeat of what officials have called the most dangerous proliferation operation in history.

The processing system found at Tradefin, an engineering and manufacturing company in Vanderbijlpark, outside Johannesburg, had been designed and built over three years. It was then tested, painstakingly dismantled and packed into 40-foot containers, factory records show.

Daniel Jacobus Van Beek, director of South Africa's counter-proliferation office, participated in the raid and called the scheme "one of the most serious and extensive attempts" to breach international nuclear controls. He estimated that the 200 tons of equipment was worth about $33 million.

Khan, a German-trained metallurgist, used stolen designs and a shadowy network of European suppliers in the 1980s to build the Pakistani plant where uranium was enriched for that country's first atomic bomb.

A decade later, he resurrected the network to sell nuclear technology on the world market. Secrecy surrounding the Khan ring began to unravel last December, when Libya announced that it was giving up its effort to build an atomic bomb.

As part of a deal negotiated with the U.S. and Britain, Libya disclosed evidence that Khan and his associates had sold Tripoli $100 million worth of technology over 10 years, including designs for a nuclear warhead.

That information led to the immediate shutdown of a Malaysian operation that manufactured centrifuges and sent investigators scrambling to follow up on evidence that the ring had sold enrichment technology to Iran and North Korea.

Under international pressure, Pakistan forced Khan to confess on national television that he had sold the country's nuclear secrets. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf pardoned Khan immediately. Investigators from the IAEA and the U.S. have not been allowed to interview the scientist, who is still revered in Pakistan.

As a result, investigators say they are still struggling to uncover the extent of the network.

In the months before police raided Tradefin, one participant said he had pressed his alleged accomplices to "melt down" the equipment, burn the designs and destroy computer files, according to statements to police. But when investigators arrived with search warrants, the evidence was intact.

Enrichment involves feeding gaseous uranium known as uranium hexafluoride into an array of slender centrifuges, which spin at ultra-high speed to transform the gas into weapons-grade material.

The pumps, gauges, valves, piping and other equipment found at Tradefin were designed to control the flow of uranium hexafluoride into 1,000 centrifuges, link them and process the enriched uranium at the end of the cycle, according to interviews, drawings and court affidavits.

Tradefin's owner, Johan A.M. Meyer, 53, was arrested a day after the raid and charged with trafficking in nuclear technology. He quickly struck a deal to provide evidence in exchange for dismissal of the charges.

Meyer, who worked in South Africa's uranium enrichment program in the 1980s, admitted in a sworn statement that he knew the complicated system was for a nuclear plant.

But he was unaware that Libya was its ultimate destination, defense attorney Heinrich Badenhorst said in an interview.

In his deal with prosecutors, Meyer implicated two associates, Gerhard Wisser, 65, and Daniel Geiges, 66, according to court records.

Wisser, a German, and Geiges, who is Swiss, both immigrated to South Africa in the late 1960s and became citizens. They were arrested on trafficking charges and freed on bail this month.

Wisser, whom prosecutors portray as the conduit to the Khan network, has long been managing director of Krisch Engineering, a consulting firm in Randburg, a suburb of Johannesburg. Geiges has worked for him since 1978.

Krisch Engineering imported equipment for South Africa's nuclear program in the 1980s in violation of international sanctions, according to a sworn affidavit from Van Beek, the anti-proliferation official.

During the same period, a second company in Germany that Wisser owned sent nuclear-related components to South Africa. Records show that German authorities revoked the firm's export privileges after learning of the shipments.

Both Wisser and Geiges have maintained their innocence regarding the Libya deal, saying they thought the equipment was for a water purification plant in an unknown country.

A South African magistrate said the explanations lacked "the ring of truth," citing Wisser's experience with the nuclear industry.

A fourth person associated with the South African connection, Gotthard Lerch, 61, was arrested last week by Swiss authorities on a German warrant accusing him of receiving $4.25 million to help Libya develop nuclear weapons. His office outside Zurich was raided the same day that South African police showed up at Tradefin.

An anatomy of the deal, assembled from documents and interviews, shows in stark and mundane ways how the Khan network exploited international businessmen — wittingly or unwittingly — to fashion a web of commerce and intrigue that stretched across the globe.

Encounter in Dubai

Gerhard Wisser was having a tough time finding new business in the Middle East for his engineering company. His fortunes took a dramatic turn during dinner at the home of a wealthy Arab in Dubai in late 1999.

Among the guests that night, Wisser has told police, were two men he knew from past business dealings.

One was Lerch. The two men had done business together when Lerch worked for a German manufacturer of vacuum pumps. They remained friends and occasional business partners.

The other acquaintance was Buhary Syed abu Tahir, then 40, a flamboyant Sri Lankan businessman who drove a Rolls-Royce and was living in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates.

Both Tahir and Lerch had ties to Pakistan's nuclear weapons program. In the 1980s, Lerch acknowledged supplying vacuum pumps and other equipment to Pakistan.

Tahir also helped Pakistan's secret nuclear effort and, by the mid-1990s, was coordinating the shipment of technology to Iran and managing Khan's dealings with Libya, according to a statement he later gave to Malaysian police.

A few minutes into the night's meal, Wisser recalled in his statement to South African police, Tahir asked whether Wisser's company could manufacture "certain pipe work systems" for an unnamed client.

Wisser's firm no longer made piping, but Tahir was not deterred. He offered a generous finder's fee if Wisser could find another company for the job.

Wisser was in the midst of what he called "a very ugly and costly divorce. I was therefore quite interested to follow the matter up and perhaps earn a good commission."

Tahir promised to obtain technical drawings for the system and have Lerch examine them before sending them to South Africa. Tahir said the piping was for a refinery in the United Arab Emirates.

"I couldn't quite believe it, but left it at that," Wisser said.

At the time, Iran and North Korea were no longer buying nuclear technology at their earlier pace and the Khan network was looking for ways to satisfy an eager new customer — Libya.

Two years earlier, in 1997, Libyan officials had contacted Khan about helping their country's stalled efforts to build an atomic bomb. The result was a business arrangement called Project Machine Shop 1001.

Tahir, who is in custody in Malaysia, gave police an extensive description of the network's operation after he was detained a year ago.

Tahir said the arrangement with Libya grew out of a meeting in Istanbul, Turkey, between Khan and Mohammed Matuq Mohammed, head of Libya's nuclear program.

Unlike Iran and North Korea, Libya lacked the technical expertise or manufacturing base to build the complex plants necessary to enrich uranium and develop a weapon.

As a result, the network had to develop an off-the-shelf enrichment facility for Libya.

Tahir said Lerch was in charge of supplying key parts for the project "by sourcing from South Africa."

South Africa offered plenty of sophisticated engineering firms and an advanced steel industry. Though the government in Pretoria had voluntarily abandoned its nuclear weapons in 1991, some of the program's industrial infrastructure remained.

Wisser had used his involvement in that program to justify a request to carry a weapon. In a 1984 application for a gun permit, he told authorities, "I very often carry highly confidential and classified documentation" from the nuclear and arms industries.

At dinner in Dubai 15 years later, the Khan network turned to Wisser, offering him a $1-million commission.

South African Visitor

Returning to Dubai a few weeks later, Wisser brought Meyer, the owner of Tradefin and an old acquaintance from the South African nuclear program. Meyer, who had built an engineering firm after leaving the government, agreed to take on Tahir's project.

Wisser was pleased for two reasons: He looked forward to his "generous commission," and he was happy to steer some "lucrative business" to a friend.

They intended to call on Tahir. Wisser wanted to introduce Meyer to the people paying the bills. But the Khan associate turned them away.

"Mr. Tahir had no wish to meet Mr. Meyer and insisted that I should rather relay payment requests and other information to him via telephone," Wisser recalled.

It was not the only oddity in their business relationship: Meyer also was never told where the finished product would be sent.

But whatever doubts Wisser and Meyer may have shared, they launched the project early in 2000 and the money started coming in.

Meyer received direct payments from Tahir, according to investigative reports. Meyer also received prepaid shipments of instruments and other material from outside South Africa, the reports said.

Wisser received the first of three installments on his commission, deposited into a Zurich bank account at a time when attorneys for his ex-wife were scouring the globe to identify his assets. Later payments were sent to his accounts in Dubai and Liechtenstein.

The initial design drawings from Pakistan were of such poor quality that Meyer complained to Wisser. During one meeting, he pointed to an 18-inch stack of design papers and called it "the beast." Wisser loaned him Geiges to refine the drawings and help supervise the project.

A two-story high complex of pipes and pumps grew in Meyer's factory, and he received periodic payments from Dubai.

"It was a very ingenious plant," said Badenhorst, Meyer's lawyer. "It was one of a kind, a work of art."

He said Meyer never tried to conceal the project. The work occurred in an open area of his factory, where visitors could see it.

"He knew he was making a system for uranium enrichment somewhere," Badenhorst said. "He didn't know where."

In late 2000, a specialized lathe capable of making uranium enrichment centrifuges was shipped to Tradefin from a company called Gulf Technical Industries in Dubai, according to shipping records.

Peter Griffin, a British citizen who lives on the French Riviera, set up Gulf Technical Industries, and it is now run by his son, Paul, according to records from the Malaysian police.

The Griffins have not been charged; both have said they had no dealings with Libya or with nuclear equipment.

The lathe was supposed to be used in South Africa to manufacture cylindrical rotors for the 1,000 centrifuges. However, Badenhorst said, this part of the project was abandoned because the specialized steel required for the rotors was not available in South Africa.

The lawyer said the lathe sat in the Tradefin factory for several months before Meyer was told to return the machine to Gulf Technical Industries in December 2001.

U.S. authorities later discovered the lathe in Libya, according to a sworn statement by Capt. Benjamin Nel, head of the South African police investigation.

With the South Africans unable to fulfill that part of the contract, the network had to find another source for the centrifuges. In late 2001, Tahir arranged for their production at a factory outside Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital.

Meanwhile, work continued in South Africa. By May 2003, the sprawling stainless-steel structure in Meyer's workshop was fully assembled and tested. Wisser's $1-million commission had been paid in full. But Meyer still awaited shipping instructions.

One day that month, two Arabs arrived to inspect the work. They said they were Egyptians, according to Wisser. They stayed at a nearby Holiday Inn and spent a week examining and testing the system.

During their visit, Wisser said, Meyer provided a list of questions for the inspectors — asking, among other things, who was to receive the finished product.

"His questions were never answered," Wisser said during his 10-hour interrogation by German investigators.

Nonetheless, they pressed ahead. The completed system was photographed, then dismantled carefully and packed in sequence into the 11 freight containers so they could be opened in order and the structure reassembled at its destination.

Shortly after the inspectors' visit, another payment arrived in Meyer's South African bank account.

Wisser told German police, "This payment, as an alarmed Meyer told me, came from Libya."

Sensitive Cargo

On Oct. 4, 2003, a German-registered freighter with the name BBC China painted on its hull left the Suez Canal and entered the Mediterranean Sea. An American spy satellite was tracking its wake.

U.S. intelligence had information that the ship was bound for Libya with sensitive cargo. The Italian coast guard was asked to intercept.

The BBC China was forced to divert to the southern Italian port of Taranto. There, five containers were removed and hauled to a nearby warehouse. Inspection confirmed the U.S. intelligence.

The wooden containers bore the stamp of the Malaysian factory used by the Khan network, and they were packed with thousands of parts and components for centrifuges destined for Libya.

The seizure helped persuade Kadafi to pledge to abandon his nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and turn over information to the U.S. and IAEA about the Khan network.

The interception was kept secret for weeks. U.S. and British intelligence agents sought to find out as much as possible about Khan's operation before Kadafi's public announcement of his decision.

The investigation focused quickly on Tahir, who had arranged the BBC China shipment. In November, acting on information from the CIA and its British equivalent, MI6, Malaysian police took Tahir into custody. He provided authorities with an extensive accounting of the network's reach, describing its connections in Spain, Turkey, Switzerland, Germany and Dubai.

He did not disclose the South African connection, but U.S. investigators in Libya had discovered the lathe and a trail of import and export records.

In December 2003, American authorities asked the South African government to look into evidence that Tradefin had supplied Libya with restricted nuclear technology, according to investigative records.

The only evidence the South African police could find was that one lathe had been imported from and later returned to Gulf Technical Industries, which had been implicated by Tahir.

The police inquiries set off alarms with Wisser. He told police later that it "dawned upon [us] that something was quite wrong here."

Still no word came regarding where to ship the cargo containers, which remained stacked in a corner of the factory. When Meyer complained that he still was owed about 15% of his fee, Wisser said he paid his partner about $150,000 from his own pocket.

Wisser also said he urged Meyer to destroy everything. The two-story labyrinth of stainless steel, Wisser said, should be sent to a smelter and melted down. The design drawings from Pakistan, Wisser said, should be committed to "an Easter bonfire."

Meyer was reluctant to destroy a project that belonged to the unknown client, and his lawyer said that Meyer regarded it as "a work of art."

So when police arrived at Tradefin on Sept. 1, they found the 11 shipping containers. They also found five trunks filled with photographs, designs, manuals and other documents — an unexpected trove of leads.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld ... -headlines
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Post by Arun_S »

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/ar ... Nov27.html

Pakistan Downplays CIA Report on Leaks

By PAUL ALEXANDER
The Associated Press
Saturday, November 27, 2004; 3:33 AM

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan on Saturday downplayed suggestions that a new CIA report indicates that a renegade scientist provided more help to Iran's nuclear weapons program than previously disclosed.

Abdul Qadeer Khan, who was considered a national hero for leading the development of Pakistan's nuclear deterrent against rival India, admitted in February to passing nuclear technology to other countries. He was pardoned by President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who cited his service to the nation, but he is under virtual house arrest in Islamabad.

The CIA this week posted on its Web site an unclassified report to Congress, "Acquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced Conventional Munitions." It details reported efforts by Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea and Syria to obtain chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons technology.

"Iran's nuclear program received significant assistance in the past from the proliferation network headed by Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan," the report said. "The A.Q. Khan network provided Iran with designs for Pakistan's older centrifuges as well as designs for more advanced and efficient models and components."

It said Libya had disclosed receiving similar assistance from Khan, head of Pakistan's nuclear program from the 1970s until 2001.

"Even in cases where states took action to stem such transfers, knowledgeable individuals or non-state purveyors of WMD- and missile-related materials and technology could act outside government constraints," the report said. "The exposure of the A.Q. Khan network and its role in supplying nuclear technology to Libya, Iran, and North Korea illustrate one form of this threat."

The New York Times reported that the CIA disclosure indicates that bomb-making designs provided by Khan's network to Iran in the 1990s were more significant than Washington has previously disclosed.

It focused on the phrase "designs for more advanced and efficient models, and components," indicating that "components" refers to weapons components.

The Times pointed out that American officials have publicly referred only to the Khan network's role in supplying Iran with designs for older Pakistani centrifuges used to enrich uranium but that they also have suspected it provided a warhead design, too.

Citing a tape it obtained of a closed-door speech to a private group, the paper quoted former CIA director George J. Tenet as describing Khan as "at least as dangerous as Osama bin Laden" because of his role in providing nuclear technology to other countries.

Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Masood Khan criticized the Times report.

"The writer of the report has spun a strange web based on flimsy evidence, hearsay and snippets of conversations," Khan said Saturday. "The CIA report does not mention any `designs for weapons or bomb-making components.' Weapons and bomb-making are the writer's own creative insertions.

"In the past year, Pakistan has conducted an inquiry to unearth an illicit network of international black-marketeers, dismantled it and shared the results of the inquiry transparently with the people of Pakistan," Khan said. "Pakistan has been cooperating with the IAEA and the international community to thwart international black-marketeers from proliferating sensitive nuclear technology."
JE Menon
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Post by JE Menon »

Looks like there's a serious pillow-fight going on in DC...
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Post by kgoan »

Yes, seems like a lot of fur flying. Sethi joins in as well in his editorial, with the standard cry of injured Pakee innocence.

BTW, I'm willing to bet this isn't just Sethi. Some of the fur flying in DC has landed on the Paks and got them worried.
EDITORIAL: Motivated media against Pakistan

In a seemingly concerted campaign against Pakistan, the American media is keeping the ghost of Dr AQ Khan alive. The latest in this series of 'investigative' reports is an NYT story headlined 'CIA Says Pakistanis Gave Iran Nuclear Aid'. For starters, we might focus on the caption of the story and the intention behind it. We refer specially to the use of the term 'Pakistanis'. What does this term mean? Pakistanis qualifies the people of Pakistan. Those in the newspaper business know the importance of both the caption and the introduction to a story. They are not only meant to catch attention but also to convey a certain image, an impression. If someone in Pakistan is guilty of proliferation, should the reference be to Pakistanis or that group, entity or the individual?

But this is not all. The story's 'facts' are also dubious. This is how the NYT story begins: "A new report from the Central Intelligence Agency says the arms trafficking network led by the Pakistani scientist AQ Khan provided Iran's nuclear program with 'significant assistance', including the designs for 'advanced and efficient' weapons components [emphasis added]."

However, the "new" CIA report is in fact a routine annual feature under Section 721 of the FY1997 Intelligence Authorisation Act. In this case, it covers the period from July 1-December 31, 2003. Its unclassified parts were posted on the CIA website on November 23, the same day the NYT story was filed and went into print for the November 24 issue. But the NYT story gets round to these details in the sixth paragraph!

The reporter, in the quoted opening paragraph, talks about "advanced and efficient weapons components". But the first two words are picked up from the report and the words 'weapons components' are added totally arbitrarily. The actual sentence in the report (http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/721_repo ... ec2003.htm) reads thus: "Before the reporting period, the AQ Khan network provided Iran with designs for Pakistan's older centrifuges, as well as designs for more advanced and efficient models, and components [emphasis added]." There is absolutely no mention of weapons components in the report. In fact, the usage is vague. Indeed, in relation to the mention of the "older centrifuges", the term should lend itself more logically to being interpreted as "more advanced and efficient models, and components [of centrifuges]." But the journalist chooses to throw in the words 'weapons components', which is both technically and factually incorrect. Weapons components would refer to warhead design or even a weaponisable configuration. Such assistance would be of a much-advanced nature than providing "centrifuges", whether old or advanced. (Incidentally, the CIA report, in the section on Libya, uses exactly the same sentence in relation to Dr Khan's assistance to that country.)

The story is aimed at alleging that Pakistan gave a warhead design to Iran and wants to create exactly this impression. This is obvious from (a) the reference to a closed-door speech to the private group by former CIA director George Tenet and (b) references to unnamed "American officials". According to the NYT, Tenet "described, Mr Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, as being 'at least as dangerous as Osama bin Laden' because of his role in providing nuclear technology to other countries". In effect there is nothing new here except the reference to Dr Khan being "at least as dangerous as Osama bin Laden". Mr Tenet, who is out of his CIA job because he also thought that the WMD case on Iraq was slam-dunk, may or may not have said it. But even if he did, he could have talked about the dangers of proliferation in an unregulated world and efforts by Al Qaeda to acquire CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear) capabilities. Similarly, the NYT story uses unnamed American officials who suspect that "the Khan network provided Iran with a warhead design as well."

There are, of course, sections in the CIA report on all key suppliers with Russia heading the list followed by North Korea and China. In the section on "Other Countries", the CIA report says:

"Although West European countries strove to tighten export control regulations, Iran continued to successfully procure dual-use goods and materials from Europe... North Korea approached Western European entities to obtain acquisitions for its uranium enrichment program. A shipment of aluminum tubing - enough for 4,000 centrifuge tubes - was halted by German authorities.

"Some West European entities remained an important source for the proliferation of WMD - and missile-related information and training. The relatively-advanced research of European institutes, the availability of relevant dual-use studies and information, the enthusiasm of scientists for sharing their research, and the availability of dual-use training and education may have shortened development time for some WMD and missile programs."

However, the NYT story inexplicably fails to mention any of this, focusing instead on Pakistan (rather than just Dr Khan) and moving from the CIA report to 'facts' gleaned from sources that remain invisible. Most important in this regard, however, is mention of Mr Tenet's "paid speeches" where he is reported by those attending his talks as saying things about Dr Khan and his network that have still not surfaced. While the ground rules are that these talks are off-the-record, one tape apparently found its way to the NYT reporter after someone decided to give it to him - just like that, we assume.

But the worst aspect of this story is this: "The warhead design provided to Libya by the Khan network was for an ageing, crude Chinese model. Such a design would nevertheless provide Iran with important assistance in what American officials say is its quest to develop nuclear weapons, a goal they say Tehran could reach in the next several years."

At no point does the CIA report talk about the Khan network having given a warhead design to Libya. Thus the sentences are even more misleading than they appear at first read. The CIA report uses the same sentence in referring to Dr Khan's help to both Iran and Libya. But since the reporter has got other sources (not the CIA report) telling him that Dr Khan might have given a warhead design to Iran, this is now presented as a fact from the CIA report! Notice how the NYT report moves from Libya, for which a warhead design might not have been helpful, to Iran, to which it could be of important assistance.

This is irresponsible journalism. We wonder what the Pakistan embassy is doing and whether someone there or in Islamabad has decided to confront this outrage. As for the CIA report itself, it is curious, isn't it, that unclassified version of the report made its way to the website just two days ahead of the IAEA meeting to review the Iranian nuclear programme. *
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Post by Rudradev »

kgoan wrote:Yes, seems like a lot of fur flying. Sethi joins in as well in his editorial, with the standard cry of injured Pakee innocence.

BTW, I'm willing to bet this isn't just Sethi. Some of the fur flying in DC has landed on the Paks and got them worried.
Oh yes, more than a hint of panic in that edit by the normally suave uberRAPE. Doubletalking fast enough to make one's head spin.

Maybe it's the spectre of seeing the CIA-- formerly one of TSPA's staunchest Washington allies, with its Beardens and such-- possibly turning against Pakistan. There is a conflict in that agency which Bush-ite Porter Goss is doing his best to smooth over, with little success thus far.
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Post by JE Menon »

Yes, with people like Stephen Kappes stepping down and that caustic comment from Thomas Twetten (who is reportedly a highly respected individual in the community), things are not looking good. Funny thing is that the CIA's old hands appear (finally) to be coming to the view that the Pakis are up to no good. Well better late than never, but they should have shown more balls at an earlier stage - it was probably institutional caution, bureaucratic inertia and internal career-oriented risk aversion that probably were the causes. Now it might be too late. It appears that it will take a NBC type attack on mainland US to crystallise the situation as far as Riyadh and Pak are concerned - although I continue to hope otherwise. The price of to be paid for the benefits of democracy. Pity.
Last edited by JE Menon on 29 Nov 2004 14:07, edited 1 time in total.
Rishikx
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Post by Rishikx »

Ramana
May 28 was HEU weapon from China. May 30 was PU from China for the NoDong/Ghauri. The samples are for HEU not Pu. QED.

Umrao jaan, The KSA ones are on the Chinese origin CSS2 IRBMs not on Silkworms which are not up to snuff and need lightweight Pu design.
Very interesting. Would be greatful if you could help me verify this.

Thanks
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Post by SaiK »

to make the matter worse all it takes is one nucklear material being stolen from pakistani safeguards by al queda or some terrorists. many balls in cia will be testified, and the worse would be musharaf's future. is this not the fundemental strategy of having all-lying relationship with pakistan so that this should not happen in the future. may be there existed some loss of control on the pakistani setup, and the reasons behind cia resignations and pakistani dis-interest in continuing operations against obl gangs. we need a clancy look into this, by connecting the dots.
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Post by Neshant »

No plans to ask for extradition of Xerox Khan (not until terrorists detonate the first n-bomb)

http://www.dawn.com/2004/11/29/top4.htm

WASHINGTON, Nov 28: The United States is believed to have assured Pakistan that it has no plan to ask for extradition of nuclear scientist Dr A.Q. Khan for interrogation as some US lawmakers and non-proliferation activists are demanding.

..

Talking about the assurances Pakistan has so far received from the US administration on the issue, Mr Sadiq said: "The Americans acknowledge that it was the information they received from Pakistan that allowed them to bust this network of international nuclear proliferators". (did they supply their own biographies :D )
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Post by Sohum »

Import-Export: Pakistan embarks upon both with a vengeance
Pakistan is likely to achieve its objective of exporting locally-built weapon systems worth US$1 billion per annum this year itself, following the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 's decision last month to import equipment off-the-shelf from Islamabad for equipping an Armoured Brigade. Present plans call for a Pakistan Army Armoured Brigade to be stationed in Saudi Arabia for a five-year period starting next January. This Brigade will be totally equipped with Pakistan-origin weapon systems like 100 Al Khalid main battle tanks (MBT); up to 600 tracked armoured vehicles like the Al Hamza, Talha and Saad armoured infantry fighting vehicles (AIFV) equipped with battlefield management systems (made locally by East West Infiniti Pvt Ltd) and Baktar Shikan wire-guided anti-armour missiles (200 launchers and 5,000 missiles made by Kahuta Research Laboratories), Sakb command AIFVs, Al Qaswa armoured personnel carriers (APC), and Al Hadeed armoured recovery vehicles (ARV).

The Pakistani Brigade will be attached to the Saudi National Guard, which currently is headed by Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz's second son, the Sandhurst-trained Lt Gen. Mitab, who is widely regarded as a knowledgeable and highly competent commanding officer. Details of the Brigade's deployment and its equipment purchases were reportedly finalised by a 40-member Saudi defence delegation, led by Prince Khalid Bin Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz, assistant minister of defence for military affairs of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, that arrived in Islamabad on 10 October 2004 for a five-day visit to Pakistan. The delegation held extensive discussions with Pakistan 's minister for defence, Rao Sikandar Iqbal, as well as President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

Earlier, a 10-member Saudi military delegation led by Maj. Gen. Khaled Bin Abdul Aziz had visited Rawalpindi on 12 January 2004 on a week-long official visit during which it received briefings on the capabilities and force modernisation plans of the Pakistan Army's Armoured Corps from its Director General, Maj. Gen. Malik Iftikhar Khan, and from Maj. Gen. Israr Ahmed Ghuman, chairman of the state-owned Heavy Industries Taxila (HIT) that produces the Al Khalid MBT and the entire family of M-113-derived AIFVs, APCs and ARVs under licence from China's NORINCO and US-based United Defence LP.
Does anyone have the complete article from the Force?
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Post by jrjrao »

LA Times.

Musharraf Scorns Nuclear Probe

Pakistani leader defends his decision to deny monitors access to accused proliferator Abdul Qadeer Khan as a matter of national pride.
WASHINGTON — Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf on Sunday defended his decision not to allow international investigators to interrogate Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani scientist accused of peddling nuclear secrets around the world.

Appearing on CNN's "Late Edition" on Sunday, Musharraf said the requests from United Nations nuclear inspectors indicated a lack of trust in Pakistan, portraying the issue as a matter of national pride.

Analysts have raised doubts about whether Musharraf is keeping Khan from speaking to international investigators for fear the scientist might reveal the extent to which some of his activities may have been condoned by the Pakistani military.

Musharraf denied "200%" that the Pakistani government or military knew that Khan was making nuclear weapons information available to other nations.
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