US
goes back to the nuclear
source By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - With the US government insisting that
Iran has been secretly working on the development of
nuclear weapons, and being frustrated that the United
Nations' watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency is
"too soft" on Tehran, a new investigation is under way
in Pakistan to find evidence of that country assisting
Iran's program.
In November the
US Central Intelligence Agency reported that the
father of Pakistan's nuclear program, Dr Abdul Qadeer
Khan, was instrumental in selling
advanced uranium-enrichment centrifuges to Iran, and that he was likely to
have sold it an actual nuclear-weapon design, along with
nuclear-fuel material.
The disgraced Khan is currently
under house arrest in Pakistan. Asia Times Online
sources say that an investigation has begun in Pakistan
to track the remnants of Khan's network and previous
activities.
Although Pakistani President
General Pervez Musharraf has denied the fact, Pakistan
has agreed to indirect US investigations into Khan and
his former network. In terms of an agreement between
Islamabad and Washington, the US has supplied a
questionnaire to Pakistan for Khan, after which his
answers will be returned to US authorities. In the light
of the answers, the US will send investigators to
Pakistan for ground checks at its nuclear plants,
laboratories or any other facilities.
An
exclusive investigation carried out by Asia Times Online
suggests that the investigations will center on the
following:
A key member of Khan's network, Sri Lankan Buhary
Seyed Abu Tahir, who is currently a resident in
Malaysia.
An unofficial facility where nuclear components
might have been handled.
The financial network supporting Khan's activities.
Initial reports have already revealed a facility
in Karachi where some of the smuggled nuclear components
might have been developed or stored. This is said to be
People's Steel Mills Mangopir, from where a local
businessmen transhipped the "consignments". The company
still operates.
Payment matters were
dealt with from the United Arab Emirates by a Dubai-based
company owned by a top Pakistani businessmen who deals
in gold.
Although investigations in fact started
in June last year, when in a surprise and unprecedented
move then finance minister and now Prime Minister
Shaukat Aziz visited the restricted areas of Pakistan's
Kahota Research Labs (see Musharraf cooks up
an American banquet , June 18, '03), the
latest investigations will focus on specific areas and
targets that the US and Pakistani governments have already
agreed upon in principle.
An official report
on a US State Department website quotes a senior Bush
administration official as saying that Khan is a
"traitor to Pakistan". The report, on Washington File,
quotes Musharraf as telling US President George W Bush
that he believed it was "absolutely in Pakistan's
interest" to uncover the remaining elements of the
so-called Khan network of nuclear proliferators.
The author, Stephen Kaufman, is Washington
File's White House correspondent. He bases his report on
a briefing with an unnamed senior Bush administration
official. "Asked about the nuclear proliferation network
run by Pakistani scientist A Q Khan, the official said
Mr Bush was grateful to Mr Musharraf for his 'decisive
move' to roll up the network, especially since the move
against Khan was initially unpopular among the Pakistani
public," the report said.
He quotes the official
as telling him that Pakistanis "have come to recognize
that A Q Khan was a traitor to Pakistan and a threat to
Pakistan's interests, and have supported President
Musharraf's efforts to crack down on the A Q Khan
network and work with us".
"As a result, a good
volume of information was provided that helped the US
and other international authorities dismantle the
network," the report said. "It allowed us to roll up
some pretty significant proliferation networks that we
would never have known about," the official told the
Washington File.
But the official said that
"more work remains to be done" and Musharraf feels it is
"absolutely in Pakistan's interest" to continue to
uncover any remaining elements of the network.
Already there are reports of a Pakistan-Saudi
Arabia nexus on nuclear projects, and observers in
Pakistan fear that if Tahir is handed over to the US, a
new Pandora's box could be opened, after which Pakistan
would come off in a bad light, though any action against
Islamabad is unlikely as long as Pakistan remains in a
strategic alliance with the US in the "war on terror".
Syed Saleem Shahzadis Bureau Chief,
Pakistan, Asia Times Online. He can be reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com.
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