| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"nkdatta8839" |
| Date: |
07 Oct 2004 12:48:46 AM |
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The Pakistani Dr. Strangelove Behind Iraq, North Korea & Iran |
http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20041004-015707-2087r.htm
The Washington Times
October 04, 2004
Iran, Pakistan and nukes
By Wilson John
The International AtomicEnergy Agency (IAEA) is currently
investigating Iran's nuclear program, especially the possibility that
Pakistan helped it with substantial transfers of technology and
materials in the past. There has been no conclusive evidence so far,
except for a piece of evidence that Pakistan had supplied designs for
an advanced centrifuge called P-2 to Iran in 1995. There is a reason
why the IAEA is finding it difficult to discover the nuclear trail in
Iran. The agency is not looking in the right places, for instance in
Pakistan. What it needs to do is not complicated, either: It has to
begin by questioning A.Q. Khan, the Pakistani nuclear scientist who
has been persuaded to go into hiding by Islamabad following
disclosures early this year that he was the kingpin in a worldwide
network of nuclear smugglers.
Mr. Khan has been actively involved in transferring nuclear
technology and material to Iran since the early 1990s. Although the
proliferation activities were clandestine, there is substantial
evidence that the Pakistani establishment — especially its external
intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence — not only knew of
the activities but assisted in the smuggling. Lt. Gen. Asad Durrani,
the ISI chief in the early 1990s, was aware of Mr. Khan's travels to
Iran in 1991 and 1992. Iran was quite willing to pay heavily for a
nuclear gateway with Pakistan. Tehran had offered $3.2 billion to
finance Pakistan's nuclear-weapons program in exchange for the
transfer of nuclear technology, as reported in the Pakistan daily
newspaper Dawn on Dec. 20, 1994.
The Pakistan-Iran nuclear connection existed since the time of
Gen. Mohammed Zia ul-Haq, who had approved unpublicized cooperation
between the two nations in the nuclear field in 1987. The cooperation
was specifically limited to nonmilitary spheres. A respected Pakistani
English-language daily published in Islamabad, the News, quoted a
retired nuclear scientist: "Just before his death in 1988 when I told
Zia about Iran's growing interest in non-peaceful nuclear matters, he
asked me to play around but not to yield anything substantial at any
cost." In fact, many believe that not only Gen. Durrani but his
superior, Gen. Aslam Beg, then the army chief of staff, were also
deeply involved in the clandestine nuclear deals with Iran.
Gen. Beg, according to a former Pakistan cabinet minister,
Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, had negotiated with Iran for a nuclear deal.
Gen. Beg bragged that "Iran is willing to give whatever it takes, $6
billion, $10 billion. We can sell the bomb to Iran at any price." A
former U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, Robert Oakley, has also referred
to a conversation with Gen. Beg during which the latter said he was
discussing nuclear cooperation with Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
Officially Pakistan has always denied having any cooperation with
Iran in the nuclear weapons program. But large sums of unaccounted
money were deposited in the personal accounts of at least two
Pakistani scientists for clandestine deals with Iran. One of them was
Muhammad Farooq, a centrifuge expert, who traveled to Iran and Libya
on behalf of Mr. Khan, and was ironically the key source of
information against Mr. Khan when U.S. and Pakistani intelligence
officials debriefed him in November. One of the startling disclosures
made by Mr. Farooq was about Mr. Khan's financial skullduggery.
Investigations have since revealed that the scientists maintained
secret bank accounts in Dubai where millions of dollars were
deposited. Noman Shah, Mr. Khan's estranged son-in-law, operated one
of the main Dubai-based front companies used by the Khan network. It
was Mr. Shah who set up a supplier firm for Mr. Khan in Dubai and
worked closely with his father-in-law until he divorced Mr. Khan's
daughter Dina after four years of marriage in 1994. Several nuclear
and missile deals signed by the Khan Research Laboratory (KRL),
including transactions with Iran, were routed through Mr. Shah.
More evidence of Mr. Khan's Iran link is an Islamabadbusinessman
named Aizaz Jaffri. In December, Mr. Jaffri reportedly flew to Iran
after three employees of the KRL were detained for questioning
following the disclosures about Mr. Khan. Officials suspect that Mr.
Jaffri's responsibility on the Iran trip was to find out how much the
Iranians had told the IAEA officials about Pakistan's involvement in
their nuclear-weapons program. Mr. Jaffri was an intermediary between
Mr. Khan and his network. The former used to work for Pakistan's
National Development Corporation, a state enterprise, before he joined
Mr. Khan's network and began acting as a front man for dozens of
businesses established by him.
An intriguing fact is Mr. Jaffri's reported association with the
state-owned China North Industries Corporation, or Norinco, which is
collaborating with Pakistan on missile and weapons development and
production. One link that has emerged in the recent investigations was
that Norinco and Mr. Khan's brother Qayuum have a stake in a Chinese
restaurant in Islamabad partly owned by Mr. Jaffri two years ago. Is
there a Chinese connection to nuclear collaboration between Iran and
Pakistan?
================================================================================
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63944-2004Sep30.html
Washington Post
Friday, October 1, 2004; Page A10
Few Factual Errors, but Truth Got Stretched at Times
By Glenn Kessler and Walter Pincus
...... In a fierce debate over nuclear proliferation, Bush asserted:
"Libya has disarmed. The A.Q. Khan network has been brought to
justice." He was referring to a nuclear smuggling ring based in
Pakistan.
But many experts also credit the patient diplomacy started in the
Clinton administration for persuading Libya to cooperate. Moreover,
Khan, a national hero in Pakistan, was pardoned by President Pervez
Musharraf, and not a single person involved in his network has been
prosecuted anywhere. Yesterday, in fact, the International Atomic
Energy Agency complained that it had been prevented from interviewing
Khan. .....
================================================================================
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0409300188sep30,1,3209937.story
Chicago Tribune
September 30, 2004
EDITORIAL
Squeezing a nuclear outlaw
The hunt for Osama bin Laden was Topic 1 last week when Pakistan
President Pervez Musharraf met with President Bush at the White House.
The two leaders discussed other things, including Musharraf's efforts
to retain his post as chief of the army. But apparently one thing that
failed to rank high on the agenda was the threat of terrorists
acquiring nuclear weapons.
To be specific, Bush reportedly didn't even try to persuade Musharraf
to allow U.S. or International Atomic Energy Agency officials a crack
at interviewing Abdul Qadeer Khan, the former head of Pakistan's
nuclear program and one of the world's most brazen nuclear profiteers.
Earlier this year, Khan's underground nuclear bazaar--dubbed the
"nuclear Wal-Mart" by IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei--was uncloaked,
solving the mystery of how North Korea, Iran and Libya acquired so
much nuclear technology so fast. The answer: Khan's network sold it to
them.
Khan, revered in his homeland as the father of the Pakistan bomb,
confessed and was instantly pardoned by Musharraf. The Pakistan
president apparently feared that his grip on power could be undermined
by a long investigation and trial of a national hero. Musharraf
insisted that Khan acted without government knowledge, a claim that is
difficult if not impossible to believe.
At the time of Khan's confession, ElBaradei raised alarms, saying Khan
was "the tip of an iceberg" in an illicit nuclear supply network with
connections in many countries. "We need to know who supplied what,
when, to whom," ElBaradei said.
Some eight months later, though, no one has those answers because
Pakistan has refused to make Khan available to outside investigators,
either from the U.S. or the IAEA. The United States, fearing that more
pressure could destabilize a crucial ally in the war on terror, hasn't
pressed the case.
That is a colossal mistake that could have devastating repercussions.
Some American intelligence officials reportedly suspect that Pakistan
is withholding information that may be embarrassing or that it is no
longer pushing Khan to spill all his secrets. In a recent interview
with The New York Times, Musharraf asserted that the United States had
never asked to question Khan. If that's true, the reason is
transparent: They knew the request would be rejected. Musharraf said
as much. If American officials had asked, he said, "we wouldn't let
them," because "that would show a lack of trust in ourselves. I mean,
we must trust our own agencies."
But how much trust can the U.S. and the rest of the world have in a
regime that so quickly pardons a nuclear outlaw? How much trust can
there be for a regime that denies any of its officials--even in its
most powerful institution, the army--knew anything about Khan's
dealings?
The world may never know exactly who bought from Khan's network. And
that is intolerable.
Musharraf said he was certain that Khan's network had been shut down.
But Musharraf also admitted that he could not be sure that Pakistani
investigators had unearthed all the customers and transactions of the
network stretching back probably over a decade or more. David
Albright, a former IAEA weapons inspector, says Pakistan may not push
Khan too hard because that could expose the illicit networks that the
country still uses to buy nuclear technology.
Iran is threatening to go nuclear. North Korea has an active nuclear
weapons program. Both were fed by Khan's network. Either of those
countries could potentially become a source of nuclear materials or
weapons for Al Qaeda, which has declared its intent to acquire and use
nuclear weapons. And others may be harboring nuclear ambitions. In
July, the Associated Press reported Syria and Saudi Arabia were being
investigated as possible Khan network clients.
If the world is to avert more nasty surprises, the Khan network must
be fully exposed and completely unraveled.
Bush can't let Musharraf off the hook. International authorities need
to know everything Khan knows. Without direct access to Khan, the
world can have little confidence that his entire network is being
rolled up, that black marketers across the world are being arrested
and brought to justice. In many ways, that's as crucial to the war on
terror as finding bin Laden.
================================================================================
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2004/October/subcontinent_October21.xml§ion=subcontinent&col=
The Khaleej Times, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
1 October 2004
‘Pakistan refuses to let IAEA quiz Qadir'
(AFP)
VIENNA — Pakistan has refused to let the UN atomic agency directly
interview disgraced nuclear scientist Abdul Qadir Khan, father of
Pakistan's atomic bomb and ringleader of a smuggling network that
supplied Iran, Libya and North Korea with sensitive nuclear
technology, an agency spokesman said yesterday.
"The Pakistanis have made it clear that while they will provide the
IAEA all information available to them, direct access to Mr Khan would
not be possible," IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said.
It was the first time the IAEA has admitted that Pakistan is refusing
to let the agency see Khan, Gwozdecky said.
The IAEA has been asking Pakistan regularly to help it investigate the
international black market run by Khan, who confessed last February to
passing on nuclear secrets.
"From the beginning, we have made it clear to the Pakistani
authorities that we would like the maximum amount of information on
the Khan network, including access to any person with such knowledge,"
Gwozdecky said.
Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri said in Teheran in
August that his country was cooperating with the IAEA probe into
Iran's suspect nuclear programme but ruled out allowing inspectors
into Pakistan as part of the crucial investigation.
He pointed out that Pakistan was not a signatory of the NPT (nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty), which mandates the IAEA to monitor
compliance with international atomic safeguards.
IAEA inspectors have found traces of highly-enriched uranium inside
Iran, leading to suspicions that Iran has been trying to produce
nuclear bombs and not just atomic energy as it insists.
But Teheran maintains the traces found their way into the country on
equipment bought from Khan's black market network.
Pakistan's cooperation with the probe is crucial in resolving
outstanding questions related to Iran's bid to generate nuclear
energy, seen by the United States as a cover for weapons development.
The IAEA wants to take so-called "environmental samples" from Pakistan
to compare them with those found in Iran — crucial in verifying
Teheran's claims.
Pakistan has supplied results from sampling it has conducted itself,
but has not allowed IAEA inspectors into the country to do their own
sampling, IAEA director general Mohamed ElBaradei said in a report
earlier this month.
ElBaradei said the IAEA needed results from its own testing to be able
to draw definitive conclusions.
================================================================================
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ FRIDAY, OCTOBER 01, 2004 12:29:06 PM ]
IAEA nails Musharraf's nuke lies
WASHINGTON: Pakistan's military ruler Pervez Musharraf brazenly lied
that the world community had not asked for access to nuclear
proliferator A Q Khan, fresh disclosures by the International Atomic
Energy Agency has indicated.
Officials of the IAEA on Thursday publicly rebutted Musharraf's claim
in a television interview last week that "nobody" had asked to
question Khan in connection with the spread of nuclear technology and
materials.
"We have not been allowed by Pakistan to talk to the man," Mohammed El
Baradei, the
Director-General of the Agency said in a BBC interview aired on
Thursday.
Asked why then Musharraf had made such a statement, El Baradei said:
"I can tell my Pakistani friends that I will be happy to send a team
tomorrow to talk to him if we can, absolutely."
In an interview with ABC World News in New York last week, Musharraf
was explicitly asked by anchor Peter Jennings why he had not made Khan
available to the US and IAEA for questioning.
"Nobody has asked, number one," Musharraf blustered, before bluntly
saying that even if Pakistan was asked it would not make him available
"because we have good interrogators" and because "it undermines our
own capability." Musharraf also claimed to have "shared all the
information that we have."
But the IAEA sees it differently. Although Pakistan had supplied
information from the tests it had conducted, El Baradei said the IAEA
needed results from its own testing to be able to draw definitive
conclusions.
The IAEA is hamstrung by the reluctance on part of the US, which
claims to be acting against nuclear proliferation, to back its demand
to access Khan. Several American analysts have suggested that Bush is
not pushing Pakistan on the Khan issue because he hopes Musharraf will
deliver Osama bin Laden before the November 2 election to ensure him a
second term.
Some commentators have gone so far as to warn that if the United
States is attacked with nuclear weapons, its origins would most likely
be Pakistan.
Describing US policy on Pakistan's proliferation as a "colossal
mistake that could have devastating repercussions," the Chicago
Tribune said in an editorial this week that "Bush can't let Musharraf
off the hook. International authorities need to know everything Khan
knows. In many ways, that's as crucial to the war on terror as finding
Bin Laden." Several other American newspapers have expressed similar
views.
But US officials have reacted to such concerns with total sang-froid,
acknowledging that Washington has not asked for Khan, but not
explaining why. Secretary of State Colin Powell and his deputy Richard
Armitage have been Musharraf's biggest apologists amid a discredited
US policy widely seen as having trumped up phony charges against Iraq
while ignoring Pakistan's proliferation.
Several analysts have surmised that Bush is so intent on winning a
second term with Musharraf's help that he is willing to wink at both
Pakistan's nuclear proliferation and the issue of democracy in the
country, the very grounds on which he carried the United States to war
against Iraq.
During the first Presidential debate on Thursday, Bush agreed with
Democratic contender John Kerry that nuclear proliferation was the
number one US concern, and went on to claim that Khan had been brought
to justice.
Asked on CNN how the President could make such a claim when Musharraf
had actually pardoned Khan, a Bush aide clarified that the President
had meant Khan ability to function had been impaired and went on to
list other non-proliferation initiatives taken by the administration.
But the IAEA observations has led several commentators to point out
that the Bush administration has ignored the more dangerous
proliferation involving Pakistan, while taking to US to war over
phantom WMD in Iraq --a point that is lost on the administration.
================================================================================
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