From May 2 onwards Pakistan would be once again at the centre of the storm over the nefarious nuclear proliferation activities by its much defamed nuclear scientist Dr AQ Khan, currently under "home arrest".
The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) is set to release a new dossier titled "Nuclear black markets: Pakistan, AQ Khan and the rise of proliferation networks: A new assessment" on the said date.
London, Apr 28 : From May 2 onwards Pakistan would be once again at the centre of the storm over the nefarious nuclear proliferation activities by its much defamed nuclear scientist Dr AQ Khan, currently under "home arrest".
The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) is set to release a new dossier titled "Nuclear black markets: Pakistan, AQ Khan and the rise of proliferation networks: A new assessment" on the said date.
The Institute has claimed that Dr Khan was "not the only nuclear arms merchant" and Pakistan not the only country implicated in his shadowy network. Rather, it claims, that the network spanned three continents and eluded both national and international systems of export controls that had been designed to prevent illicit trade. This highlighted the concerns that nuclear technology is no longer the monopoly of the industrially advanced countries, but possibly can be purchased off-the-shelf by both states and terrorist groups.
The new revelations are bound to trigger some uncomfortable questions to Pakistan, who is said to be struggling to get a copy of the new dossier beforehand so that it could prepare itself before the lid of the pandora's box is blown off.
According to The News, the international press, particularly those in London, Washington and New Delhi, might find a lot of "juicy stuff about Pakistan" from the new dossier. It would held the media in establishing yet again the fact that in addition to certain countries like Iran, North Korea, and Libya, now even terrorists were capable of getting nuclear weapons from black markets like one was being operated by Dr Khan.
The fresh findings about Dr Khan's network might put Iran under pressure more than Pakistan, because the focus on Khan's activities and his links with Iran would establish a point that actually the network had played a role in facilitating Tehran to establish its own nuclear facilities.
It also provides a comprehensive assessment of the Pakistani nuclear programme from which the Dr Khan network emerged, the network's proliferation activities, and the illicit trade in fissile materials. In addition, the dossier provides an overview of the clandestine nuclear procurement activities of other states, along with the efforts made both by Pakistan and the international community to prevent reoccurrence of further proliferation networks and to secure nuclear technology. The final chapter assesses policy options for further action.
The IISS is the world's leading authority on political-military conflict. It has offices in the US and in Singapore with charitable status in each jurisdiction.
The IISS was founded in 1958 in the UK by a number of individuals interested in maintaining civilised international relations in the nuclear age. Much of the institute's early work focused on nuclear deterrence and arms control and was hugely influential in setting the intellectual structures for managing the Cold War.
--- ANI
