Rat Faced
10-13-2004, 06:07 PM
May now be happening because we're there :(
The U.N. nuclear watchdog is worried the U.S.-led war aimed at disarming Iraq may have unleashed a proliferation crisis if looters have sold equipment that can be used to make atomic weapons, Western diplomats said.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which monitored Saddam Hussein's nuclear sites before last year's Iraq war, said on Monday equipment and materials that could be used to make atomic weapons have been disappearing from Iraq but neither Baghdad nor Washington had noticed.
"If some of this stuff were to end up in Iran, some people would be very concerned," a diplomat close to the IAEA told Reuters. "The IAEA's big concern would be profiteering, people who would sell this stuff with no regard for who is buying it."
The profiteers could have sold the items on to groups or countries interested in weapons, the diplomat added.
The United States believes Iraq's neighbor, Iran, is secretly developing nuclear weapons under cover of a civilian atomic energy program. Tehran denies this, insisting its nuclear ambitions are limited to generating electricity.
Pre-war U.S. allegations that Saddam had revived his atomic weapons program from the early 1990s have never been proven.
But the IAEA has warned countries to keep a close eye on all their nuclear sites due to multiple warnings from Western intelligence agencies that terrorist organizations are interested in getting their hands on a nuclear device, informs Reuters.
According to the NEWS, An alarming report that nuclear material had disappeared from Iraq under the noses of the US-led Allies and Iraqi authorities yesterday prompted calls for the return of UN weapons inspectors.
The UN nuclear watchdog said in a letter to the UN Security Council that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) remained concerned about the "widespread and apparently systematic" dismantling of Iraqi nuclear sites.
It is not the first time that the IAEA has expressed such concern, prompting fears that the equipment could be sold by looters to countries such as Iran. But the timing of the report is politically sensitive. Coming less than three weeks before the US presidential election, it could cause further criticism of policies in Iraq.
The Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw , played down the IAEA report in Parliament, saying that he believed that most of the looting had taken place amid the chaos that followed the Iraq war in spring last year.
Equipment which could be used in an illicit nuclear bomb programme has disappeared from previously monitored sites in Iraq, and radioactively contaminated items from there have been found abroad, the International Atomic Energy Agency has told the UN.
Installations in Saddam Hussein's former nuclear bomb programme were being systematically dismantled, its director general, Mohammed ElBaradei, has told the security council, warning of the implications for trafficking.
In a letter to Sir Emyr Jones Parry, the British diplomat presiding over the security council, Dr ElBaradei said his inspectors had "been able to identify quantities of industrial items, some radioactively contaminated, that had been transferred out of Iraq from sites [previously] monitored by the IAEA."
These did not not include "high precision equipment" with a dual civilian or military use which would be valuable in a nuclear bomb programme. But he added: "The disappearance of such equipment and materials may be of proliferation significance."
The warning will further embarrass the US and British governments, which justified the war in Iraq with the alleged threat of weapons of mass destruction, insisting that Saddam Hussein had an active nuclear bomb programme, reports the Guardian Unlimited.
How the hell can anyone defend this?
Nuclear materials from Iraq 'missing'
Ian Traynor in Zagreb
Wednesday October 13, 2004
The Guardian
Equipment which could be used in an illicit nuclear bomb programme has disappeared from previously monitored sites in Iraq, and radioactively contaminated items from there have been found abroad, the International Atomic Energy Agency has told the UN.
Installations in Saddam Hussein's former nuclear bomb programme were being systematically dismantled, its director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, has told the security council, warning of the implications for trafficking.
In a letter to Sir Emyr Jones Parry, the British diplomat presiding over the security council, Dr ElBaradei said his inspectors had "been able to identify quantities of industrial items, some radioactively contaminated, that had been transferred out of Iraq from sites [previously] monitored by the IAEA".
These did not not include "high precision equipment" with a dual civilian or military use which would be valuable in a nuclear bomb programme. But he added: "The disappearance of such equipment and materials may be of proliferation significance."
The warning will further embarrass the US and British governments, which justified the war in Iraq with the alleged threat of weapons of mass destruction, insisting that Saddam Hussein had an active nuclear bomb programme.
Dr ElBaradei appealed for information about any of the vanished equipment. Last night the Iraqi science and technology minister, Rashad Omar, invited the UN nuclear inspectors to return to Iraq to check on the missing equipment and materials.
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"The locations that belong to the science and technology ministry are secure and under our control," Mr Omar told Reuters. He said that Tuwaitha, the vast compound south of Baghdad which contained Iraq's main nuclear facility, was being turned into a science park. "The IAEA came back one month ago, it inspected the plant and other ones and didn't say anything.
"We are transparent. We are happy for the IAEA or any other organisation to come and inspect," he said, adding that he had not seen the agency's report to the security council.
The run-up to the war in Iraq last year was marked by intense hostility between the Bush administration and the weapons inspectors, with Washington and London scorning the inspections, which are now known to have successfully dismantled Saddam Hussein's secret bomb programme in the mid-90s.
The inspectors have been virtually barred from Iraq by the US since before the war and Dr ElBaradei's information on the missing equipment has come from satellite photography and other sources.
Some of the contaminated equipment and material from Iraq is believed to have been located in Turkey, Egypt, Jordan and the Netherlands.
Iran is widely suspected of conducting a clandestine bomb project and might be keen to obtain some of the sophisticated engineering equipment on the loose in Iraq.
The past nine months have also seen revelations about an extensive international network of nuclear smugglers, centred in Pakistan, supplying contraband equipment to at least three countries.
"The invasion of Iraq was supposed to be about stopping weapons of mass destruction. It was supposed to be about stopping nuclear materials from getting out from under UN control," Greenpeace said yesterday. "The only winners in this story are those who are looking to capitalise on security failures by scoring loose nukes."
Greenpeace raised the alarm about nuclear chaos in Iraq last year after visiting the Tuwaitha complex.
In June, just before the US handed authority in Iraq to the interim government, the US forces secretly flew almost two tonnes of uranium and associated equipment from Iraq to the US, causing a diplomatic row with the IAEA, which is mandated to monitor and verify the nuclear complexes and stockpiles.
The IAEA, Dr ElBaradei said, "continues to be concerned about the widespread and apparently systematic dismantlement that has taken place at sites previously relevant to Iraq's nuclear programme".
Source (http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1325814,00.html)
So, we invaded to stop Terrorists getting the stuff... then let it get looted and give them it... nice going :dry:
The U.N. nuclear watchdog is worried the U.S.-led war aimed at disarming Iraq may have unleashed a proliferation crisis if looters have sold equipment that can be used to make atomic weapons, Western diplomats said.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which monitored Saddam Hussein's nuclear sites before last year's Iraq war, said on Monday equipment and materials that could be used to make atomic weapons have been disappearing from Iraq but neither Baghdad nor Washington had noticed.
"If some of this stuff were to end up in Iran, some people would be very concerned," a diplomat close to the IAEA told Reuters. "The IAEA's big concern would be profiteering, people who would sell this stuff with no regard for who is buying it."
The profiteers could have sold the items on to groups or countries interested in weapons, the diplomat added.
The United States believes Iraq's neighbor, Iran, is secretly developing nuclear weapons under cover of a civilian atomic energy program. Tehran denies this, insisting its nuclear ambitions are limited to generating electricity.
Pre-war U.S. allegations that Saddam had revived his atomic weapons program from the early 1990s have never been proven.
But the IAEA has warned countries to keep a close eye on all their nuclear sites due to multiple warnings from Western intelligence agencies that terrorist organizations are interested in getting their hands on a nuclear device, informs Reuters.
According to the NEWS, An alarming report that nuclear material had disappeared from Iraq under the noses of the US-led Allies and Iraqi authorities yesterday prompted calls for the return of UN weapons inspectors.
The UN nuclear watchdog said in a letter to the UN Security Council that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) remained concerned about the "widespread and apparently systematic" dismantling of Iraqi nuclear sites.
It is not the first time that the IAEA has expressed such concern, prompting fears that the equipment could be sold by looters to countries such as Iran. But the timing of the report is politically sensitive. Coming less than three weeks before the US presidential election, it could cause further criticism of policies in Iraq.
The Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw , played down the IAEA report in Parliament, saying that he believed that most of the looting had taken place amid the chaos that followed the Iraq war in spring last year.
Equipment which could be used in an illicit nuclear bomb programme has disappeared from previously monitored sites in Iraq, and radioactively contaminated items from there have been found abroad, the International Atomic Energy Agency has told the UN.
Installations in Saddam Hussein's former nuclear bomb programme were being systematically dismantled, its director general, Mohammed ElBaradei, has told the security council, warning of the implications for trafficking.
In a letter to Sir Emyr Jones Parry, the British diplomat presiding over the security council, Dr ElBaradei said his inspectors had "been able to identify quantities of industrial items, some radioactively contaminated, that had been transferred out of Iraq from sites [previously] monitored by the IAEA."
These did not not include "high precision equipment" with a dual civilian or military use which would be valuable in a nuclear bomb programme. But he added: "The disappearance of such equipment and materials may be of proliferation significance."
The warning will further embarrass the US and British governments, which justified the war in Iraq with the alleged threat of weapons of mass destruction, insisting that Saddam Hussein had an active nuclear bomb programme, reports the Guardian Unlimited.
How the hell can anyone defend this?
Nuclear materials from Iraq 'missing'
Ian Traynor in Zagreb
Wednesday October 13, 2004
The Guardian
Equipment which could be used in an illicit nuclear bomb programme has disappeared from previously monitored sites in Iraq, and radioactively contaminated items from there have been found abroad, the International Atomic Energy Agency has told the UN.
Installations in Saddam Hussein's former nuclear bomb programme were being systematically dismantled, its director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, has told the security council, warning of the implications for trafficking.
In a letter to Sir Emyr Jones Parry, the British diplomat presiding over the security council, Dr ElBaradei said his inspectors had "been able to identify quantities of industrial items, some radioactively contaminated, that had been transferred out of Iraq from sites [previously] monitored by the IAEA".
These did not not include "high precision equipment" with a dual civilian or military use which would be valuable in a nuclear bomb programme. But he added: "The disappearance of such equipment and materials may be of proliferation significance."
The warning will further embarrass the US and British governments, which justified the war in Iraq with the alleged threat of weapons of mass destruction, insisting that Saddam Hussein had an active nuclear bomb programme.
Dr ElBaradei appealed for information about any of the vanished equipment. Last night the Iraqi science and technology minister, Rashad Omar, invited the UN nuclear inspectors to return to Iraq to check on the missing equipment and materials.
Advertiser links
Natwest Personal Savings Bond
Guaranteed interest rate of 4.85% per annum net when you...
natwest.com
Sainsbury's Bank Direct Saver Account
Make the most of your hard earned savings with tiered rates...
sainsburysbank.co.uk
NatWest E-Savings Account
Looking for attractive interest rates and instant access to...
natwest.com
"The locations that belong to the science and technology ministry are secure and under our control," Mr Omar told Reuters. He said that Tuwaitha, the vast compound south of Baghdad which contained Iraq's main nuclear facility, was being turned into a science park. "The IAEA came back one month ago, it inspected the plant and other ones and didn't say anything.
"We are transparent. We are happy for the IAEA or any other organisation to come and inspect," he said, adding that he had not seen the agency's report to the security council.
The run-up to the war in Iraq last year was marked by intense hostility between the Bush administration and the weapons inspectors, with Washington and London scorning the inspections, which are now known to have successfully dismantled Saddam Hussein's secret bomb programme in the mid-90s.
The inspectors have been virtually barred from Iraq by the US since before the war and Dr ElBaradei's information on the missing equipment has come from satellite photography and other sources.
Some of the contaminated equipment and material from Iraq is believed to have been located in Turkey, Egypt, Jordan and the Netherlands.
Iran is widely suspected of conducting a clandestine bomb project and might be keen to obtain some of the sophisticated engineering equipment on the loose in Iraq.
The past nine months have also seen revelations about an extensive international network of nuclear smugglers, centred in Pakistan, supplying contraband equipment to at least three countries.
"The invasion of Iraq was supposed to be about stopping weapons of mass destruction. It was supposed to be about stopping nuclear materials from getting out from under UN control," Greenpeace said yesterday. "The only winners in this story are those who are looking to capitalise on security failures by scoring loose nukes."
Greenpeace raised the alarm about nuclear chaos in Iraq last year after visiting the Tuwaitha complex.
In June, just before the US handed authority in Iraq to the interim government, the US forces secretly flew almost two tonnes of uranium and associated equipment from Iraq to the US, causing a diplomatic row with the IAEA, which is mandated to monitor and verify the nuclear complexes and stockpiles.
The IAEA, Dr ElBaradei said, "continues to be concerned about the widespread and apparently systematic dismantlement that has taken place at sites previously relevant to Iraq's nuclear programme".
Source (http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1325814,00.html)
So, we invaded to stop Terrorists getting the stuff... then let it get looted and give them it... nice going :dry: