A former Pakistani army chief actively "encouraged" the proliferation of nuclear technology to other countries by scientist A.Q. Khan's network, the author of a think tank's dossier on the disgraced scientist's proliferation network has said.
Mark Fitzpatrick said General (retd) Mirza Aslam Beg, who was the army chief from 1988 to 1991, "encouraged" the Khan networks sale of nuclear technology to other countries.
In his report that he wrote for the London-based
International Institute for
Strategic Studies (IISS), Fitzpatrick identified Khan as the head of the group that sold nuclear technology and equipment to Iran, Libya and North Korea.
Islamabad May 9 - A former Pakistani army chief actively "encouraged" the proliferation of nuclear technology to other countries by scientist A.Q. Khan's network, the author of a think tank's dossier on the disgraced scientist's proliferation network has said.
Mark Fitzpatrick said General (retd) Mirza Aslam Beg, who was the army chief from 1988 to 1991, "encouraged" the Khan networks sale of nuclear technology to other countries.
In his report that he wrote for the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), Fitzpatrick identified Khan as the head of the group that sold nuclear technology and equipment to Iran, Libya and North Korea.
"Ego, money, nationalism and a sense of Islamic fraternity" motivated Dr Khan and his supporters to sell nuclear technology to other Muslim countries, he said.
"Different motivations in different cases," Fitzpatrick said yesterday while launching in Washington his dossier on Khan and his nuclear proliferation network.
Fitzpatrick, a former US deputy assistant secretary of state for non-proliferation, claimed that Pakistan had made a nuclear bomb 10 years after establishing its nuclear programme.
Pakistan had also established a procurement network to keep its programme running and was "still using it to acquire foreign technology," Fitzpatrick told the Dawn daily.
The former US official said he understood that Pakistan "aspires" to have civil nuclear deal with the US similar to the one India has been offered. However, before it happens, the international community will have to have "more confidence in the command and control system that Pakistan has put in place," Fitzpatrick said.
"But concerns about Pakistans nuclear weapons falling into the hands of religious extremists will remain as long as theres instability in the country, he added.
Commenting on an advertisement in some Pakistani newspapers about missing nuclear materials, Fitzpatrick said such materials that are used in agricultural and medical labs and were called radioactive sources, could not be used for making nuclear weapons.
"But the terrorists, if they get hold of such materials, can make a dirty bomb by strapping dynamite to it. This cannot kill many people but it can cause a scare, which can kill many," the author of the
IISS dossier told the daily.
