Hindu Vivek Kendra
A RESOURCE CENTER FOR THE PROMOTION OF HINDUTVA
   
 
 
«« Back
Bizarre Bazaar

Bizarre Bazaar

Author: Seema Sirohi
Publication: Outlook
Date: January 12, 2004

Introduction: N-weapons going cheap. Does Musharraf know?

When sales brochures from Pakistan's Khan Research Laboratories (KRL) are found with dangerous middlemen in Libya and Iran, who trade in illegal nuclear technology, the tracks are difficult to cover. When second-hand Pakistani centrifuges are discovered by UN inspectors in Iran, the plot thickens. When Colonel Muamar Gadaffi's son reveals that Libya spent millions buying plans from Pakistani scientists to make a nuclear bomb, it is time to pull the alarm. In some ways, the Bush administration has done so, leaking like a sieve to the US media about the hair-raising state of affairs inside Pakistan's nuclear establishment.

US and European pressure forced Islamabad last month to question the father of the Pak bomb, Abdul Qadeer Khan, and three of his associates. From the slew of reports, Pakistan seemed more like a nuclear cornershop
than a country in control of its assets. The New York Times last week nailed Pakistan as the intellectual and trading hub of a loose network of hidden nuclear proliferators. It quoted a senior US official as saying: "These guys are now three for three as supplier to the biggest proliferation problems we have", referring to Pakistan's nuclear links to Libya, Iran and North Korea.

The centrifuges found in Iran last year are a modified version of those built by Urenco, a European consortium where Khan worked in the 1970s. He stole the design and was later convicted by a Dutch court in absentia. According to David Albright, a former UN inspector, Pakistan made a number of machines before abandoning them for a sturdier model. The early models or Pak-1s were given to Iran in 1987, the nyt reported. Last week, it revealed that Pakistan was also the source for Libya making "major strides" in uranium enrichment.

Khan was publishing papers in the 1980s, boasting and advertising his skills. In 1991, his team even wrote about how to etch grooves on the centrifuge, a specially difficult skill. According to a report by the American Congressional Research Service, sales brochures from KRL soon followed and in 2000 the Pakistani government ran its own advertisement announcing export rules for nuclear gear. But US strategic interests in Pakistan prevented any overt censure.

The story is the same today. Private jitters felt by US officials are a sharp contrast to public affirmations of faith in Pakistan, a key ally. No one wants to jeopardise Musharraf's already precarious position-two close attempts on his life were enough to scare Washington. President George Bush, has never mentioned Pakistan's leaky nuclear set-up. When asked about Pakistani nuclear weapons, he said curtly, "Yes, they are secure."

US spokesmen blandly repeat Musharraf's assurances given after 9/11 to secretary of state Colin Powell about stopping all proliferation. "We are confident that Pakistan takes these issues very seriously and has taken robust steps to secure its sensitive materials," a state department spokesman told Outlook. But in 2002, spy satellites caught a Pakistani plane picking up missile parts in North Korea, believed to be in exchange for Pakistani nuclear technology. Last October, Italy intercepted centrifuge components going to Libya which were based on Pakistani designs.

Nuclear technology has continued to leak from Pakistan despite Musharraf's assurances. "Whether he is deliberately doing this or can't control the activity-either way it is a dangerous situation," says Stephen Cohen, a veteran South Asia analyst. "It is a sort of a hear-no-evil, see-no-evil policy. The Bush administration is caught in a dilemma. It can't sanction Pakistan but finds it hard to influence what goes on inside."

The deal between North Korea and Pakistan has long been in the public realm. Now, revelations about the Pakistani hand in the nuclear programmes of Iran and Libya have shocked the US."I wonder whether the reported transactions with Iran began when Pakistan's former army chief Aslam Beg (1988-1991) was advocating a posture of 'strategic defiance' against the US and an alliance with Iran," says Michael Krepon, a nuclear expert. Question now is: can Musharraf put an end to it all?
 


Back                          Top

«« Back
 
 
 
  Search Articles
 
  Special Annoucements