IRAQ DOES HAVE WMD: ARMS MAN
By DEBORAH ORIN
nypost.com
October 6, 2003 -- The head of the weapons hunt in Iraq yesterday said his teams are hot on the trail of anthrax and Scud missiles, and he's "amazed" that anyone could think the search so far is a failure.
David Kay also said, "We're going to find remarkable things" about Iraq's weapons program.
His teams have already found a vial of botulinum toxin - "one of the most toxic elements known" - in the refrigerator of an Iraqi scientist who'd hidden it since 1993.
"[The Iraqi scientist] was also asked to hide others, including anthrax," Kay said. "After a couple of days, he turned them back because he said they were too dangerous - he had small children in the house.
"We're actively searching for at least one more cache of [toxins] . . . It's much larger. It contains anthrax, and that's one reason we're actively interested in getting it," he told "Fox News Sunday."
He said Iraqis have told him that until early 2002, they were able to make missile fuel for the long-range Scuds that were fired at Israel and Saudi Arabia in the 1991 Gulf War, then banned under U.N. restrictions.
"Scud-missile fuel is only useful in Scud missiles, no other class of missiles that Iraq has . . . Why would you continue to produce Scud-missile fuel if you didn't have Scuds? We're looking for the Scuds," he said.
Kay stressed that even now, Iraqi scientists who cooperate are at risk. One was assassinated the same day that he spoke to U.S. officials.
Kay, a former U.N. inspector, added that, "I'm surprised no one has paid attention to" his revelation last week that the Iraqis also violated U.N. sanctions by working on new toxins like Congo-Crimea and hemorrhagic fever. |
