Dutch Twice Abandoned Plans to Prosecute A.Q. Khan at CIA Insistence, Former PM Says

The CIA asked the Netherlands to forgo prosecution of former top Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan in the 1970s and 1980s for allegedly making illegal nuclear transfers from a Dutch company he worked for, former Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers said today (see GSN, Jan. 20, 2004).

“The American intelligence applied one of their common tactics. They said, ‘Give us all the information and don’t arrest him, let the man go. We’ll follow him and uncover more details,’” Lubbers told Dutch radio. “I doubted it was the right course to let him go to get more information.”

Lubbers was prime minister of the Netherlands from 1982-1994 (Associated Press, Aug. 9).

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