US tried to protect 3 in CIA nuclear spy effort: book

US tried to protect 3 in CIA nuclear spy effort: book
http://www.spacewar.com/reports/US_tried_to_protect_3_in_CIA_nuclear_spy_effort_book_999.html Washington (AFP) Jan 10, 2011 The United States

pressured Swiss authorities not to prosecute three people suspected of weapons trafficking who had been helping a CIA spy effort, according to a book released this month. In the book "Fallout: The True Story of the CIA's Secret War on Nuclear Trafficking," authors Catherine Collins and Douglas Frantz argue that pressure helped avoid prosecution of Friedrich, Urs and Marco Tinner, a father and two sons suspected of helping Abdul Qadeer Khan, considered the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb.
"Senior members of the George W. Bush administration and US intelligence officials intervened at the highest level of the Swiss government to pressure it to destroy evidence in a criminal investigation of nuclear trafficking," the authors said.
"The Americans also used their influence to persuade the Swiss to abandon plans to prosecute six CIA agents for espionage."
According to the book, CIA agents in 2003 copied the contents of a computer of Marco Tinner, where they found plans for a Chinese atomic weapon from the 1960s and documents from the Pakistani nuclear program.
The CIA was trying to scope out the Khan network, which is believed to have sold nuclear weapons technology to Libya, Iran and North Korea, according to the book.
The authors said the CIA in 1999 recruited as an informant Urs Tinner, who had been directing construction of a uranium enrichment plant for Libya. The father and brother were recruited later.
The three Tinners were arrested in 2004 by Swiss authorities who seized computers with much of this information.
But after repeated pressure from Washington, which did not want to compromise the spy effort, Switzerland destroyed the documents in 2008. The pressure came from the highest levels in Washington, including then secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.
"The conversation was conducted in the polite language of international diplomacy, but the meaning was clear: if the Swiss didn't dispose of the cases against the Tinners and the CIA, the United States would portray them as a hindrance to worldwide counterproliferation efforts and roll out the years of warnings that went unheeded by Swiss officials," the book said.

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Iran's Nuclear Domino Effect by Andrew Roberts

A former Bush defense official says that Saudi Arabia and Pakistan might initiate a dangerous alliance if Iran develops nuclear weapons. Andrew Roberts speaks to Eric Edelman about the unintended consequences for South Asia. 


Might the impending nuclearization of Iran rapidly lead to a situation in which India targets nuclear weapons on Saudi Arabia? That is one of the many unnerving repercussions envisaged in an authoritative article, “The Dangers of a Nuclear Iran,” in the current issue of Foreign Affairs, written by, among others, Eric Edelman, President George W. Bush’s undersecretary of defense for policy from 2005 to 2009. When an analyst of Edelman’s seniority and ability, who moreover was working in the Pentagon with full access to all the available intelligence on precisely this issue as recently as two years ago, pronounces on questions of this gravity it behooves us to pay serious attention.
More at:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-01-02/irans-nuclear-weapons-could-lead-to-a-saudi-and-pakistan-alliance

Swiss Nuclear Smuggling Family Tied to CIA

Swiss Nuclear Smuggling Family Tied to CIA
http://www.darkgovernment.com/news/swiss-nuclear-smuggling-family-tied-to-cia/

A seven-year effort by the Central Intelligence Agency to hide its relationship
with a Swiss family who once acted as moles   inside the world’s most
successful atomic black market hit a turning   point on Thursday when a Swiss
magistrate recommended charging the men   with trafficking in technology and
information [...]

Pakistan test fires nuclear-capable missile

http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Pakistan_test_fires_nuclear-capable_missile_999.html Islamabad (AFP) Dec 21, 2010 Pakistan on Tuesday successfully test fired a medium-range ballistic missile capable of carrying nuclear and conventional warheads, the military said. The military said in a statement that Ghauri Hatf 5, with a range of 1,300 kilometres (800 miles), could carry conventional and other warheads.
The launch was conducted by the Army Strategic Force command's strategic missile group at the end of a field-training exercise aimed at testing the force's operational readiness, the statement said.
Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee chairman General Khalid Shahmeem Wyne and other senior military officers and scientists witnessed the tests, it said.
"You have made the nation proud and we salute you for your outstanding work," Gilani told the scientists and engineers.
Gilani said Pakistan could be proud of its defence capability and the reliability of its nuclear deterrence. This capability, he added, formed the bedrock of Pakistan's security policy and will continue to be enhanced.
"The test amply demonstrates the credibility of our minimum deterrence strategy, which is the cornerstone of our security policy and ensures peace in the region," he said.
"It also sends the right signals internationally that Pakistan's defence capability is impregnable and should never be challenged."
Gilani said Pakistan was a responsible nation with an extremely reliable nuclear capability and did not harbor any aggressive designs against anyone.
South Asian rivals India and Pakistan -- which have fought three wars, two of them over the disputed territory of Kashmir -- have routinely carried out missile tests since both demonstrated nuclear weapons capability in 1998.
Pakistan's arsenal includes short-, medium- and long-range missiles named after Muslim conquerors.
"Let there be no doubt that Pakistan's armed forces are highly professional, motivated and fully capable of safeguarding Pakistan's security against all types of aggression," Gilani added.

Was Obama’s Asian tour a formation of a new nuclear alliance? Analysis by Hasbullah Shafi'iy

The glaring geopolitical significance of Obama’s well-planned strategic Asian tour last month has been deliberately or otherwise ignored by the mainstream media. India, Indonesia, South Korea and Japan. It cannot be by coincidence that these nations are encircling China (which has nuclear weapons) and secondly that they are all connected to a larger picture of nuclear alliances that are being formed. India is a nuclear power directly facing Pakistan, which is the only Muslim nation in the world that has nuclear weapons. Indonesia is the largest Muslim nation with strong ties with Pakistan and Iran. South Korea faces North Korea, which has nuclear weapons. North Korea is not only a strong political as well as military ally of Iran, but also strong bilateral trade ties with China too; and Japan is situated next to both North Korea and China and is crucial to the containment policy against Russia, which is a nuclear power as well. Has the United States begun a containment policy for China as well?

WikiLeaks: Fears Myanmar building nuclear program

Pakistan media retract fake WikiLeaks story lambasting IndiaIslamabad (AFP) Dec 10, 2010 - Leading Pakistani newspapers on Friday retracted an explosive story that used fake US diplomatic cables to brand Indian generals "genocidal" and accuse New Delhi of sponsoring militants. The News claimed on Thursday that cables released by WikiLeaks showed Indian spies were supporting Islamist militants in Pakistan's northwest tribal region of Waziristan and the southwestern province of Baluchistan. Datelined from Washington, the newspaper told how US diplomats thought of one Indian general as "incompetent" and a "geek", and of another as "self-obsessed, petulant and idiosyncratic" and "barely tolerated" by subordinates. It likened another to late Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic "with regard to butchering Muslims through war crimes" in Indian-held Kashmir. But on Friday The News wrote that "on further inquiries, we learnt from our sources that the story was dubious and may have been planted." The News said the report originated from some local websites "known for their close connections with certain intelligence agencies". A variety of Pakistani newspapers carried the report on Thursday, crediting the story to the Islamabad-based Online news agency, where a receptionist on Friday refused to put through telephone calls from AFP to senior editors. English-language newspaper The Express Tribune also published a front-page retraction, saying it "deeply regrets publishing this story without due verification and apologises profusely for any inconvenience". India and Pakistan have fought three wars since independence from Britain in 1947 and Pakistan's powerful military establishment continues to see India as its primary threat, despite a Taliban insurgency along the Afghan border.

http://www.spacewar.com/reports/WikiLeaks_Fears_Myanmar_building_nuclear_program_999.html Washington (AFP) Dec 9, 2010 Dockworkers and foreign businessmen have seen evidence of alleged secret nuclear and missiles weapons sites being built deep in the Myanmar jungle, a leaked US diplomatic cable said Thursday. "The North Koreans, aided by Burmese workers, are constructing a concrete-reinforced underground facility that is '500ft from the top of the cave to the top of the hill above'," according to the cable, published by the British daily The Guardian.
The cable from the US embassy in Rangoon was among those released Thursday by the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks, and quoted a Myanmar officer who said he had witnessed the North Korean technicians helping the construction work.
One foreign businessman told the embassy that he had seen reinforced steel bar, larger than for just a factory project, being shipped on a barge. While dockworkers also told of seeing suspicious cargo.
A cable dating from August 2004 revealed information from a Myanmar officer in an engineering unit who said surface-to-air missiles were being built at a site in a town called Minbu in west-central Myanmar.
He said some 300 North Koreans were working at the site, although the US cable noted this was improbably high, The Guardian said.
The military junta in Myanmar has dismissed reports of its nuclear intentions and brushed aside Western concerns about possible cooperation with North Korea.
But in July US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed worries about military ties between the two countries saying a ship from Pyongyang had recently delivered military equipment to Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.
"We continue to be concerned by the reports that Burma may be seeking assistance from North Korea with regard to a nuclear program," she said.
A June documentary by the Norwegian-based news group Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB) said Myanmar was trying to develop nuclear weapons, citing a senior army defector and years of "top secret material."
The DVB documentary gathered thousands of photos and defector testimony, some regarding Myanmar's network of secret underground bunkers and tunnels, which were allegedly built with the help of North Korean expertise.
According to another leaked US cable from 2009, a well-placed source in the Myanmar military government said General Thura Shwe Mann had visited North Korea in 2008.
But the source backtracked later insisting the talks were only exploratory.

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UN watchdog approves nuclear fuel bank

http://www.nuclearpowerdaily.com/reports/UN_atomic_watchdog_approves_nuclear_fuel_bank_999.html Vienna (AFP) Dec 3, 2010 The UN atomic watchdog on Friday voted to set up a nuclear fuel bank, under its auspices, to allow countries access to nuclear energy without risking the spread of atomic weapons. The International Atomic Energy Agency's 35-member governing board approved a United States-sponsored proposal for a 150-million-dollar (112-million-euro) fuel bank, with 28 countries in favour.
No country voted against the resolution, but six developing countries -- Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, South Africa, Tunisia and Venezuela -- abstained.
One country's delegation, Pakistan, chose to be absent when the vote was held in a gesture showing it was disassociating itself from the project.
The resolution was based on an original proposal by former IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei, but which ran into stiff resistance last year.
Developing nations saw it as a way for the existing western nuclear powers to curtail other countres' right to acquire and develop nuclear technology of their own for peaceful purposes.
The resolution stipulated that only countries whose supplies were halted for political reasons and which had a clean non-proliferation record would access to the bank.
But such conditions were rejected by Pakistan, one of only a handful of nations which refuse to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
"We are thus obliged to disassociate ourselves from such specific elements of the draft resolution," said Pakistan's ambassador Khurshid Anwar. Accordingly, the Pakistan delegation was absent when the vote was held.
Among those countries in favour, the EU said such a fuel reserve "can bring benefits for energy security and for non-proliferation, without distorting the existing well-functioning market."
Possessing the uranium-enriching technology used to produce fuel for nuclear power plants is a major proliferation concern because it can also be used to manufacture the fissile material for an atomic bomb.
The proponents of the fuel bank believe that such a mechanism will mean that the increasing number of nations interested in using nuclear power to meet their growing energy needs can still do so without having to possess the sensitive uranium-enrichment technology.
Earlier this week, Russia already announced that it had created the world's first such fuel bank in Angarsk.
The Rosatom state atomic energy corporation said the Siberian fuel reserve would have enough material to refuel two civilian nuclear power plants. It too will also operate under the auspices of the IAEA.

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UN atomic watchdog approves nuclear fuel bank

http://www.nuclearpowerdaily.com/reports/UN_atomic_watchdog_approves_nuclear_fuel_bank_999.html Vienna (AFP) Dec 3, 2010 The UN atomic watchdog on Friday voted to set up a nuclear fuel bank, under its auspices, to allow countries access to nuclear energy without risking the spread of atomic weapons. The International Atomic Energy Agency's 35-member governing board approved a United States-sponsored proposal for a 150-million-dollar (112-million-euro) fuel bank, with 28 countries in favour.
No country voted against the resolution, but six developing countries -- Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, South Africa, Tunisia and Venezuela

-- abstained.
One country's delegation, Pakistan, chose to be absent when the vote was held in a gesture showing it was disassociating itself from the project.
The resolution was based on an original proposal by former IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei, but which ran into stiff resistance last year.
Developing nations saw it as a way for the existing western nuclear powers to curtail other countres' right to acquire and develop nuclear technology of their own for peaceful purposes.
The resolution stipulated that only countries whose supplies were halted for political reasons and which had a clean non-proliferation record would access to the bank.
But such conditions were rejected by Pakistan, one of only a handful of nations which refuse to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
"We are thus obliged to disassociate ourselves from such specific elements of the draft resolution," said Pakistan's ambassador Khurshid Anwar. Accordingly, the Pakistan delegation was absent when the vote was held.
Among those countries in favour, the EU said such a fuel reserve "can bring benefits for energy security and for non-proliferation, without distorting the existing well-functioning market."
Possessing the uranium-enriching technology used to produce fuel for nuclear power plants is a major proliferation concern because it can also be used to manufacture the fissile material for an atomic bomb.
The proponents of the fuel bank believe that such a mechanism will mean that the increasing number of nations interested in using nuclear power to meet their growing energy needs can still do so without having to possess the sensitive uranium-enrichment technology.
Earlier this week, Russia already announced that it had created the world's first such fuel bank in Angarsk.
The Rosatom state atomic energy corporation said the Siberian fuel reserve would have enough material to refuel two civilian nuclear power plants. It too will also operate under the auspices of the IAEA.

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Pakistan's growing nuclear programme By Syed Shoaib Hasan BBC News, Karachi

Pakistan's first nuclear reactor was established with help from the United States in 1965 during the regime of military dictator Gen Ayub Khan.

Gen Khan's protege and then foreign minister, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, was the driving force behind the programme, which was based at Nilore near Islamabad.
It was set up under the Atoms for Peace programme initiated by President Dwight D Eisenhower.
At the time it was strictly peaceful and intended to help meet Pakistan's civilian energy needs under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
A few years later Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto became prime minister. He launched a nuclear weapons programme in 1974 as India and Pakistan competed in a new South Asian arms race.
Codenamed Project 706, Pakistan's plan to enrich its own uranium was conceived and led by Munir Ahmed Khan, a brilliant US-trained nuclear and electronics engineer.
He was joined a year later by a name that is now synonymous with Pakistan's nuclear programme - Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan.
It was Dr Khan - later disgraced for transferring technology to Iran and Libya - who was instrumental in setting up Pakistan's first nuclear enrichment plant at Kahuta near Islamabad.
Project 706 thus became Kahuta Research Laboratories, where enriched uranium for Pakistan's first nuclear weapon was produced.
Pakistan is believed to have developed a nuclear device by 1984, when Dr Khan alluded to it in an interview with a Western journalist.
Since then Pakistan's nuclear power complex has undergone a rapid expansion.

Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan developed Pakistan's nuclear bomb

The organisation in charge is the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC), which is headed by a civilian nuclear physicist or engineer.
It operates eight fuel production and enrichment facilities, three mining concerns and one heavy water production facility.
The original bomb was a small uranium device with about the power of those the US dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
It was unwieldy and could only be launched from a bomber specially fitted for the purpose.
But Pakistan has made rapid advances since then - it is now said to have 70-90 weapons in its stockpile.
Many of these have been miniaturised to be mounted on ballistic missiles with ranges of more than 2,000km (1,245 miles), bringing many Indian cities within reach.
China is believed to have played a critical role in Pakistan's nuclear programme, and is said to have helped it manufacture many of its weapons.
Nuclear weapons development and advancement in Pakistan is primarily done by PAEC with Chinese collaboration, reports say.
Western officials believe that long-range missile technology was also acquired from North Korea in the 1990s - in exchange for Pakistani help with its nuclear programme.
Meanwhile, proliferation experts believe Pakistan continues to make rapid strides in the development of uranium enrichment facilities and its weapons development complex.
Work has been proceeding rapidly on the construction and expansion of plants in Chasma and Sihala.
Pakistani engineers, with help from the Chinese, are also said to be in the advance stages of developing MIRV technology for its missiles. This would allow the military to fit several warheads on the same ballistic missile and then launch them at separate targets. More at:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11888973

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China to build another nuclear reactor for Pakistan

Pakistan and China deepened their relationship on Monday when it emerged there were plans for a fifth Chinese-built nuclear reactor. The revelation was timed to coincide with President Barack Obama's visit to India, Islamabad's arch rival.

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Nuclear expansion in China

Nuclear expansion in China
As the world's most populous country and fastest growing major economy, it's no surprise that China needs energy - lots of energy. Its thirst for oil has been a major driver for the dramatic increase in crude prices since 2004, and its heavy reliance on coal has created severe pollution problems and made China the world's largest emitter of CO2. http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-nuclear-expansion-china.html

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US asks for Pak-China nuke arrangement details

U.S. presses Pakistan to disclose details of Chinese nuclear deal
Pakistan must reveal details about a deal it signed with China to build reactors at the Chashma nuclear plant, according to Richard Holbrooke, U.S. special envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan. U.S. Undersecretary of State for Nuclear Security Thomas D'Agostino had said the U.S. believed that the deal may not be compliant with rules laid out by the Nuclear Suppliers Group. D'Agostino added that China needs to secure clearance from the NSG before transferring reactor technology to Pakistan. The Times of India/Press
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/US-asks-for-Pak-China-nuke-arrangement-details/articleshow/6792300.cms

Mumbai Terror Scout Shot Footage of Indian Nuclear Site from GSN Daily News

A man who admitted to scouting out target locations for the Mumbai terror attacks said he also shot footage of India's Bhabha Atomic Research Center and its living quarters for Pakistan's intelligence service, the Times of India reported today (see GSN, Oct. 19).
Former Chicago resident David Headley told Indian investigators he was asked by Major Iqbal, his manager at Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, to scope out the Mumbai-based nuclear facility and its residential area as a possible attack site. "He gave me the mobile phone camera (and) some counterfeit money," said Headley, who is now in U.S. custody. More at: http://gsn.nti.org/gsn/nw_20101022_2723.php

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U.S. Seeks Details on Pakistan-China Atomic Deal from GSN Daily News

The United States has called on Pakistan to offer specifics on its nuclear power plant development deal with China, Asian News International reported today (see GSN, Sept. 23).
"We have asked Pakistan to provide details about the nuclear pact with China," U.S. special envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke said. "It is yet to be seen what international requirements [the] Pak-China nuclear pact fulfills," the Nation reported him as saying.
Washington has suggested Beijing must obtain Nuclear Suppliers Groups clearance to build two new 300-megawatt reactors in the South Asian state's Chashma nuclear site. As it developed strategic weapons outside the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Islamabad has been cut off from most atomic trade.
China argues that it did not need approval from the atomic exporter nations as its work at the Chashma site predates its membership in the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Both Beijing and Islamabad have said the deal would meet the International Atomic Energy Agency's nonproliferation requirements.
High-level Pakistani diplomats and defense officials met this week with Obama officials in Washington for a third round of strategic talks (see GSN, Oct. 20).
Holbrooke said the two sides discussed Islamabad's wish for a bilateral nuclear civilian trade agreement with Washington, similar to the deal India received in 2008. The United States has played down the potential for a deal that would give Pakistan access to U.S. nuclear materials and technology.
"We are well aware of the Pakistani strategic goal and desire. It's one of the many things we have talked about frankly in private with our friends in Pakistan," Holbrooke said (Asian News International/Sify.com, Oct. 22).
http://gsn.nti.org/gsn/nw_20101022_4628.php

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Iran doesn't need nuclear weapons: Pakistan

Iran doesn't need nuclear weapons: Pakistan

Washington (AFP) Oct 18, 2010 The foreign minister of Pakistan said Monday that Iran had no justification to pursue nuclear weapons and urged the neighboring country to embrace overtures from the United States. In some of Pakistan's strongest statements on Iran's controversial nuclear program, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said that he wanted to avoid "another major crisis in the region."
"In my view, I don't think they have a justification to go nuclear," Qureshi said at Harvard University.
"Who's threatening Iran? I don't see any immediate threat to Iran," he said, while adding that Pakistan accepted Iran's "right to civilian use of technology."
Qureshi said he has shared his views with Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki and told him to seize on US President Barack Obama's stated willingness to engage in dialogue to mend decades of fraught US-Iranian ties.
"This administration has been extending the olive branch -- make use of it. Engage the world," Qureshi said.

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Pakistan to Push for Nuclear Deal With U.S.

Pakistan still keen on securing U.S. nuclear deal

 

Pakistan officials say they may propose a nuclear-cooperation pact with the U.S. when Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi meets with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton next week in Washington, D.C. The Pakistani officials, however, said that "expectations are very low" for such a deal, given rival India's close ties with the U.S. The Wall Street Journal

 

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China Suspected of Undermining Missile Proliferation Controls

A recent report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service cautions that China could be undermining international efforts to limit the spread of missile technology through its dealings with Iran, Pakistan and North Korea (see GSN, May 26).
The Congressional Research Service report on conventional arms transfers to the developing world states that "credible reports persist in various publications that China has sold surface-to-surface missiles to Pakistan. North Korea and Iran have also reportedly received Chinese missile technology, which may have increased their
capabilities to threaten other countries in their respective neighborhoods.
Such activities reported by credible sources raise important questions about China’s stated commitment to the restrictions on missile transfers set out in the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), including its
pledge not to assist others in building missiles that could deliver nuclear weapons," according to the Sept. 10 report.
Beijing is not a member of the informal grouping of nations that seeks to curb the spread of critical missile technologies that could carry weapons of mass destruction or conventional warheads.
"Because China has military products -- particularly missiles -- that some developing countries would like to acquire, it can present an obstacle to efforts to stem proliferation of advanced missile systems to some areas of the developing world where political and military tensions are significant, and where some nations are seeking to develop military capabilities of an asymmetric nature," the report says (U.S. Congressional Research Service report, Sept. 10).

US ‘Angry’ at Pakistan’s Nuke Expansion Moves

Pakistan Rushing to Increase Supply of Weapons-Grade Fissile Material

by Jason Ditz

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China-Pakistan Deal Harbinger of Nuclear Exceptionalism? By: Saurav Jha | Briefing

Reports last week suggested that China is considering investing in a large, 1,000-megawatt reactor in Pakistan. If validated, they indicate that Chinese policymakers have given the go-ahead to a nuclear development plan prioritizing early export of indigenous large reactors, while simultaneously underlining Beijing's willingness and ability to pursue a policy of nuclear exceptionalism in the subcontinent.

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The Next Nuclear Arms Race Is Between China And India

The Next Nuclear Arms Race -- Wall Street Journal

China and India are raising the stakes by modernizing and deploying more forces along their shared border.

India and Pakistan are the two countries most likely to engage in nuclear war, or so goes the common wisdom. Yet if recent events are any indication, the world's most vigorous nuclear competition may well erupt between Asia's two giants: India and China.

Both countries already house significant and growing arsenals. China is estimated to have approximately 450 warheads; India, roughly 100. Though intensifying as of late, Sino-Indian nuclear competition has a long history: India's pursuit of a weapons program in the 1960s was triggered in part by China's initial nuclear tests, and the two have eyed one another's arsenals with mounting concern ever since. The competition intensified in 2007, when China began to upgrade missile facilities near Tibet, placing targets in northern India within range of its forces.

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