Syrian Reactor Was Not Peaceful, White House Says

Syria was within weeks or months of finishing a nuclear reactor that had no peaceful applications before Israel destroyed the facility last September, senior U.S. intelligence officials told Congress yesterday (see GSN, April 24).

In a series of briefings to congressional committees, Bush administration officials said North Korea began advising Syria on the nuclear project as early as 1997 and construction began in 2001. 

Israel acquired more definitive intelligence a year ago and destroyed the facility in a Sept. 6 air raid.

“It was nearing operational capability,” said one of the senior intelligence officials who briefed reporters yesterday (Robin Wright, Washington Post, April 25).

The timing of yesterday’s disclosure was intended to press Syria to admit its nuclear ambitions and to pressure North Korea to adhere to its denuclearization obligations as laid out in a six-nation deal agreed last year, according to U.S. officials (see related GSN story, today).

In addition, officials feared that an earlier release of the information could spur violence between Israel and Syria, the Washington Times reported.

“Our first concern was to prevent conflict and broader confrontation in the Middle East,” said one of the senior intelligence officials.  “Syria would feel great pressure to retaliate,” the official said, but “as time has passed, that assessment has receded” (Gertz/Carter, Washington Times, April 25).

Among other data shared with lawmakers was a video showing images taken from inside the Syrian facility that analysts said was clearly a gas-cooled, graphite-moderated reactor, the same type that North Korea has used to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons (Wright, Washington Post).

“We are convinced, based on a variety of information, that North Korea assisted Syria’s covert nuclear activities,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said yesterday.  “We have good reason to believe that reactor … was not intended for peaceful purposes” (White House release, April 24).

Bolstering this view was the absence of electrical generation equipment and the overall secrecy of the project, the Post reported. 

Still, the intelligence officials acknowledged that the site lacked facilities that would logically accompany a nuclear weapons site, such as a reprocessing plant to separate plutonium from the reactor’s spent fuel.

The incomplete nature of the site contributed to intelligence agencies assigning only “low confidence” to the idea that Syria was seeking nuclear weapons, the officials said.

One nonproliferation expert agreed with that cautionary stance.

The evidence that the site was a reactor was “compelling,” said David Albright, head of the Institute for Science and International Security.  “But the lack of other facilities, such as [a] plutonium separation plant, has to give pause before accusing Syria of having an active nuclear weapons program.”

The acquisition of additional intelligence was hampered by Syria using a controlled demolition to raze the site one month after the Israeli attack, the officials said.

That attack was conducted with U.S. foreknowledge, but not its approval, according to a senior administration official.

“Israel made the decision to attack,” the official said.  “It did so without any so-called green light from us.  None was asked for and none was given” (Hess/Riechmann, Associated Press/International Herald Tribune, April 25).

North Korea has suspended its nuclear cooperation with Syria, said Christopher Hill, the State Department official leading the U.S. delegation to the six-nation talks on North Korean denuclearization.

“It is the judgment of the United States that there is not an ongoing cooperation with Syria in this area,” Hill said.  “We will deal with this issue as we do with many other issues in the six parties” (Agence France-Presse/Spacewar.com, April 25).

Meanwhile, top U.N. nuclear official Mohamed ElBaradei complained today that his International Atomic Energy Agency only yesterday received the U.S. information on the alleged Syrian reactor.  He also criticized the Israeli attack.

“The director general deplores the fact that this information was not provided to the agency in a timely manner,” the agency said in a statement.

“The agency will treat this information with the seriousness it deserves and will investigate the veracity of the information. Syria has an obligation under its safeguards agreement with the IAEA to report the planning and construction of any nuclear facility to the agency.

“The director general views the unilateral use of force by Israel as undermining the due process of verification that is at the heart of the nonproliferation regime,” the release says (International Atomic Energy Agency release, April 25).

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