To an extent Pakistan is still dependent on illicit sources and smuggling routes to maintain its nuclear weapons making capability, alleged Mark Fitzpatrick, the editor of a research dossier — “Nuclear markets: Pakistan, A. Q. Khan and the rise of proliferation networks — a net assessment” — launched at a press conference here on Wednesday at the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS), UK’s leading think tank.
LONDON, May 2: To an extent Pakistan is still dependent on illicit sources and smuggling routes to maintain its nuclear weapons making capability, alleged Mark Fitzpatrick, the editor of a research dossier — “Nuclear markets: Pakistan, A. Q. Khan and the rise of proliferation networks — a net assessment” — launched at a press conference here on Wednesday at the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS), UK’s leading think tank.
He was asked how the rolling had up of the alleged A. Q. Khan network impacted on Pakistan’s ability to continue its nuclear programme.
Mr Fitzpatrick said that since the countries producing and exporting nuclear technology and raw materials were obliged not sell such materials to Pakistan because it had not yet entered international agreements on nuclear non-proliferation, Islamabad had no alternative but to fall back on smuggling networks which he suspected were still functioning in various forms.
Answering a question on how much did Dr Khan make from his ‘private’ nuclear enterprise, the editor of the dossier said he had information about $100 million only which he was said to have received from Libya, “but I don’t know what had happened to this amount”.
He agreed that so far not many have been apprehended from the countries which supplied their technology and raw material to the Khan network.
“We know of three arrests and prosecution, but many apprehended earlier have been released for want of evidence,” he added.
He sidestepped a question which wondered how a dossier on clandestine nuclear networks could be considered complete without the mention of the network which provided Israel with its bomb.
He, however, agreed with the suggestion that most of the nuclear bomb making capable countries, including the US, had acquired their capability through illicit routes.
Mr Fitzpatrick mumbled some vague answer when he was asked how did the CIA miss noticing the clandestine network of A. Q. Khan all those years (the US Presidents were certifying annually from 1981 to 1990 that Pakistan had not acquired N-weapon capability presumably on the CIA information) when in fact it was the CIA itself which had finally confronted President Gen Musharraf in 2003 with documentary proof of the illicit goings on.
The dossier which runs into 176 pages mentions few significant new findings and in conclusion makes it even clearer that without full details of the Khan’s confession, the world was not going to know much about his network or other such enterprises, some of which are suspected to be still in existence.
While confirming that Pakistan is still operating illicit nuclear routes, the dossier states that confidential cooperation (with IAEA) will help the agency and western intelligence bodies establish the answers to the key unanswered questions of how much help Dr Khan gave Iran, which other countries or individuals had access to the nuclear bomb design, to whom else he might have offered nuclear technology, and what became of the missing centrifuge components when the network dissolved.
“If Pakistan were to release Dr Khan’s confession and details about the government’s investigation and law-enforcement actions, this transparency would help allay suspicions of the government involvement in Dr Khan’s proliferation activities,” the dossier states rather helplessly.
The dossier meekly concludes: “If Pakistan were to conclude that it already has a sufficiently credible nuclear deterrent and if India were to cap its own fissile material production -- perhaps as part of an international treaty or as an independent decision -- then Pakistan would have no further reason to continue enriching uranium and producing weapon-usable plutonium. It would no longer need to rely on black market procurement for its own nuclear weapons programme. An end to this procurement would eliminate Pakistan’s incentive to keep nuclear black market suppliers in place. An end to Pakistan’s own enrichment-related foreign procurement and the evasion of foreign export controls that this entails would also remove one obstacle blocking Pakistan’s receipt of the same exemption from nuclear supplier rules that the US proposed for India”.
Taking the cue from the dossier, Dr John Chipman, director-general and chief executive of the IISS, reinforced the laughable and self-serving charade which the Western researchers on the subject have developed around the A. Q. Khan network.
While introducing the dossier, Dr Chipman said: “He (Khan) was in fact both (government representative and independent businessman), in varying degrees according to the circumstances. Pakistan’s complicity in his proliferation ranged along the spectrum. At one end, his procurement for Pakistan’s nuclear programme was state authorised, supported and funded, although he had great autonomy in making his own purchases. At the other end of the spectrum, the Khan network’s sales to Libya of centrifuge equipment produced in Malaysia, Turkey, Europe and South Africa and trans-shipped in Dubai were almost exclusively private business transactions, beyond the state control. A 1990 offer to provide Iraq with enrichment technology and project designs for a nuclear bomb also appears to have been a private venture by the network, although the dearth of information makes it hard to draw conclusion.”
