Author: Glenn Kessler
Publication: Washington Post
Date: November 13, 2002
URL: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A45961-2002Nov12.html
The Bush administration has evidence
that suggests Pakistan assisted North Korea's covert nuclear weapons
program as recently as three months ago, much later than previously
disclosed, according to sources in the administration and on Capitol
Hill.
While the administration has taken
a hard line against North Korea, demanding that it verify it has
dismantled its efforts to enrich uranium before U.S. officials engage
in further discussions with the communist state, it has taken a much
softer tack against Pakistan. Publicly, officials have suggested
that if Pakistan, a key ally in the war against terrorism, had provided
help to North Korea in the past, it changed its behavior after the
Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington.
But in reality, U.S. officials say,
the administration believes Pakistan continued to trade nuclear technical
knowledge, designs and possibly material in exchange for missile
parts up until this summer, when the administration concluded North
Korea was secretly trying to construct a facility to enrich uranium
for a bomb. Administration officials would not discuss the extent
of the evidence, but they said it involves highly suspicious shipping
trade.
"Let's put it this way: There were
still shenanigans going on three months ago," an administration official
said. Intelligence officials who have briefed members of Congress
have also disclosed the administration's concerns that Pakistan's
illicit nuclear trade continued well into this year.
Pakistan's involvement in North
Korea's program has put the administration in an extremely delicate
position. Under U.S. law, if the president determines that a country
has delivered nuclear enrichment equipment, material or technology
without international safeguards, the United States must suspend
economic and military aid. Such sanctions were imposed against Pakistan
in 1979, but last year President Bush waived them and other nuclear-related
sanctions after the Pakistani government agreed to help in the fight
against al Qaeda and Afghanistan's Taliban militia after the Sept.
11 attacks.
Rather than press Pakistan for a
full accounting, U.S. officials said they have noted the latest evidence
-- which Pakistani officials have argued is innocent -- and believe
they have put Pakistan on notice that future violations will not
be tolerated. Intelligence officials plan to closely scrutinize transactions
between Pakistan and North Korea.
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf
has personally guaranteed that questionable transactions with North
Korea will cease, and U.S. officials believe he would like to halt
the nuclear leakage. But they also question whether he has full control
of all entities that could be doing business with North Korea. "In
the end, we may find he is only partially truthful," the official
said.
Several experts said it will be
difficult to understand the scope of the North Korean program --
which by some estimates would not be operational for several years
-- unless the administration demands that Pakistan disclose exactly
what it might have provided to North Korea.
"We have asked North Korea to verifiably
dismantle its nuclear enrichment program," said Robert J. Einhorn,
former assistant secretary of state for nonproliferation in the Clinton
and Bush administrations and now a senior adviser at the Center for
Strategic and International Studies. "How will we know if North Korea
has done that unless we know precisely what Pakistan has transferred
to North Korea?"
Pakistani officials publicly insist
that they have not helped the North Korean program in any way.
"No material, no technology ever
has been exported to North Korea," said Ashraf Jehangir Qazi, the
Pakistani ambassador to the United States. "I can assure you there
is no way we would underestimate the seriousness of such an international
breach."
Qazi said that while Pakistan has
engaged in trade with North Korea, "nobody can tell us if there is
evidence, no one is challenging our word. There is no smoking gun."
Last month, U.S. officials confronted
North Korea with their conclusion that it had a covert nuclear program.
Then, North Korea unexpectedly admitted it.
Pakistan produces highly enriched
uranium for nuclear weapons, and U.S. officials have long suspected
that Pakistani nuclear scientists had disturbing ties to the North
Koreans.
In the face of Pakistan's vehement
denials, U.S. officials have been publicly anxious not to suggest
that Musharraf, who seized power in 1999 in a bloodless coup, is
anything but a close friend and ally.
Indeed, asked last month about reports
that Pakistan provided assistance to North Korea's program, White
House spokesman Ari Fleischer did not confirm the reports but noted:
"Many things that people may have done years before September 11th
or some time before September 11th, have changed. September 11th
changed the world and it changed many nations' behaviors along with
it."
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell
has been careful publicly not to suggest when Pakistan may have helped
North Korea. Instead, he said that as recently as last month, he
spoke to Musharraf "about the need not to assist North Korea in any
way and have any kind of relationship with North Korea now that would
give them the wherewithal to develop those kinds of weapons or the
means to deliver them."
Powell said he purposely did not
dwell on past behavior because "the past is the past and there isn't
a whole lot I can do about it. I'm more concerned about what is going
on now. We have a new relationship with Pakistan."
Leonard Weiss, a former Senate staffer
who specialized in nonproliferation issues, said there is "no question"
that, under a 1976 law known as the Symington amendment, Pakistan
would qualify for sanctions if it aided North Korea's program. But
he said that if officials decide not to probe too deeply, "they avoid
the political problem of having to give them a waiver."
