'IF' Greed is good....
Therefore...........
Pakistan Says Its Iran Nuke Probe Hints at Greed
Tue Dec 23, 8:07 AM ET Add Top Stories - Reuters to My Yahoo!
By David Brunnstrom
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan admitted on Tuesday that scientists involved in its atom bomb program may have been driven by "personal ambition or greed" to export technology to Iran, but added the government had no part in any such deals.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan said Pakistan was determined to get to the bottom of allegations that nuclear technology may have been transferred to Iran.
He said it began questioning scientists from a state-run laboratory set up by the father of its bomb program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, five to six weeks ago after approaches by the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and information from the Iranian government that "pointed to certain individuals."
"There are indications that certain individuals might have been motivated by personal ambition or greed. But we have not made a final determination," he said.
He stressed that the government itself had never been involved in nuclear proliferation. "It takes its responsibility as a nuclear weapons state very seriously," he said.
"The government of Pakistan has not authorized or initiated any transfers of sensitive nuclear technology or information to other countries," he said. "This is out of the question."
The spokesman said anyone involved in any nuclear technology transfers would be punished: "Nobody is above the law."
On Monday, Islamabad revealed that A.Q. Khan, revered as a national hero for developing a nuclear bomb tested in 1998 to match that of rival India, was being questioned in connection with "debriefings" of several scientists working at his Khan Research Laboratories, a uranium enrichment plant near Islamabad.
IDENTICAL CENTRIFUGE DESIGNS
The admission came after diplomats said last month that the IAEA was probing a possible link between Iran and Pakistan. This followed Tehran's acknowledgement that it had used centrifuge designs that appeared identical to ones used in Islambad's quest for the bomb.
Tehran, accused by Washington of seeking to develop nuclear arms, told the IAEA it had obtained the designs from a "middleman," a Western diplomat said at the time.
On Sunday, Islamabad said Yasin Chohan, one of three Pakistani scientists detained earlier in the month, had been allowed home after a "personnel dependability and debriefing session." It said two others, Mohammad Farooq, and another identified only as Saeed, were "still undergoing debriefing."
On Monday, Bush administration officials said Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf had assured Washington that his government had not -- at least "in the present time" -- provided any nuclear secrets to countries like Iran and North Korea (news - web sites).
White House spokesman Scott McClellan called Musharraf's personal assurances "important" and added that close cooperation between the United States and Pakistan in the war on terrorism would continue -- despite any transfers of nuclear technology and know-how that might have taken place in the past.
Past allegations of Pakistani technology transfers, not only to Iran but also to North Korea, have been an embarrassment for the White House, which relies on Pakistan as a key ally in its battle against al Qaeda and allied Islamic militants.
It was inevitable that the spotlight of the Iran probe should turn to A.Q. Khan, who worked in the 1970s at a uranium enrichment plant run by British-Dutch-German consortium Urenco.
According to diplomats, the centrifuge designs used by Iran were of a machine made by the Dutch enrichment unit of Urenco.
In 1983, after his return to Pakistan, Khan was sentenced in absentia to four years' jail by an Amsterdam court for attempted espionage, a decision later overturned on appeal.
Earlier this year, Washington announced commercial sanctions on Khan Research Laboratories, alleging it had arranged transfer of nuclear-capable missiles from North Korea to Pakistan. Islamabad protested over the decision. |
