Iraq:  IAEA Inspectors Expected to Return This Week

International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors are expected to return to Iraq by the end of the week to evaluate the security of radioactive material stored at the Tuwaitha complex, the main site in Iraq’s former nuclear program, an agency spokesman said yesterday (see GSN, May 26).

IAEA inspectors will “determine what is missing and what it will take to recapture that material and ultimately repackage it and reseal it and secure the facility,” agency spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said.  “The mission is limited to verifying Iraq’s safeguards obligations,” he said.

The United States limited the scope of the IAEA’s planned mission to Iraq, Gwozdecky said.

“The IAEA was informed by the United States that at this stage, the occupying powers are responsible for the health and safety of the Iraqi people, including nuclear health and safety issues,” Gwozdecky said.  “The IAEA stands ready, if requested, to provide assistance in these areas,” he added (Susanna Loof, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, May 26).

Suspicious Finds

Meanwhile, British military experts have learned through interrogations with captured Iraqi officials about Iraq’s efforts to develop a ballistic missile with a range of more than 600 miles, according to the London Sunday Telegraph.

The missile was being developed by the Iraqi Military Industrialization Commission, according to the Telegraph.  While Iraqi officials have said the missile was only designed to be equipped with a conventional warhead, British experts have said it could have been modified to carry biological or chemical weapons. 

A senior Iraqi engineer who worked at the commission said the missile had entered the development stage just prior to the recent war.  “If it had not been for the war, development would have been completed within a year,” the engineer said.

Former U.N. nuclear inspector David Kay said Iraq’s plans to develop the missile proved that ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein never intended to comply with U.N. disarmament requirements.

“This is the smoking gun we have been looking for,” Kay said.  “We have known all along that Saddam was desperate to develop a delivery system for his mass destruction weapons, and this missile would undoubtedly have given him that capability,” he added (London Sunday Telegraph, May 25).

A team of international experts is traveling to Iraq to inspect two recovered trailers that the United States suspects were used as mobile biological weapons laboratories, a top U.S. military commander said yesterday (see GSN, May 21; Associated Press/Los Angeles Times, May 27).

It is only “a matter of time” before U.S. forces in Iraq find Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yesterday.

“Given the number of prisoners now that we’re interrogating, I’m confident that we’re going to find weapons of mass destruction,” Myers said (USA Today, May 27).

Intelligence

U.S. weapons experts have begun using locally gathered intelligence, instead of what is seen as outdated U.S. information, in their efforts to find evidence of Iraqi WMD programs, according to the Associated Press.

Weapons experts have begun collecting their own information through interviews with Iraqi scientists and factory workers, according to AP.  U.S. military officials hope the new approach will improve the quality of gathered information.

“The frustration level is increasing as we keep getting constant negative results,” said Lt. Col. Keith Harrington.  “Intelligence needs to play a main role here,” he said (Dafna Linzer, Associated Press/San Diego Union-Tribune, May 26).

Some coalition experts, however, have complained about the quality of information taken from Iraqi sources, according to the Associated Press.

“The human intelligence has been massively problematic,” said Lance Corp. David Reed, a member of a two-man British team that operates a ground-penetrating radar system (Dafna Linzer, Associated Press, May 27).

In an effort to increase Iraqi cooperation with coalition forces searching for weapons of mass destruction, the coalition’s Baghdad radio station announced today rewards for any new information that could aid the search.

“Give the coalition any information on mobile laboratories … help in preserving the safety of the Iraqi people,” the announcement said.  “If you bring forward any information, the coalition will keep your identity secret and provide you with protection if you want it.  You will receive a reward,” it said (Agence France-Presse, May 27).

Bush Exaggerated WMD Threat, Senator Says

U.S. Senator Joseph Biden (D-Del.) said Sunday that U.S. President George W. Bush overstated the threat posed by Iraqi weapons of mass destruction prior to the war.

“I do think that we hyped nuclear, we hyped al-Qaeda, we hyped the ability to disperse and use these weapons,” Biden said on NBC’s Meet the Press.

Such exaggerations were unnecessary because it was obvious Iraq had violated U.N. resolutions, Biden said, while acknowledging that exaggeration is a tactic “that tends to be done by all presidents” who push for war.

“I think a lot of the hype here is a serious, serious, serious mistake and it hurts our credibility,” he said (James Gordon Meek, New York Daily News, May 26).

Chalabi Apparent Source of New York Times Reporter’s Stories

A primary source for New York Times reporter Judith Miller’s articles concerning the U.S. search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq appears to be Ahmad Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress opposition group, according to an internal Times e-mail obtained by the Washington Post (see GSN, April 21).

Miller’s connection to Chalabi came to light when John Burns, the Times’ Baghdad bureau chief, criticized Miller for writing a piece earlier this month on Chalabi without his approval.  In an e-mail, Miller defended her actions, noting her long association with Chalabi, and revealed that he was her primary source for her WMD-related coverage.

“I’ve been covering Chalabi for about 10 years, and have done most of the stories about him for our paper, including the long takeout we recently did on him.  He has provided most of the front-page exclusives on WMD to our paper,” Miller said in her reply to Burns.

Miller refused to comment on the e-mails obtained by the Post.  Andrew Rosenthal, Times assistant managing editor for foreign news, said it is a “pretty slippery slope” to publish reporters’ private e-mails and to reveal any of their possibly confidential sources.

Rosenthal defended Miller’s connections to Chalabi.  “If you were in Iraq and weren’t talking to Chalabi, I’d wonder if you were doing your job,” he said (Howard Kurtz, Washington Post, May 26).

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Iran I:  Opposition Group Alleges Iran Has Backup Uranium Enrichment Sites

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — A leading Iranian opposition group today claimed that Iran has built two previously unknown uranium enrichment facilities — components in Iran’s alleged efforts to develop a nuclear weapons capability by 2005 (see GSN, May 23).

At a press conference today, representatives of the National Council of Resistance of Iran provided detailed information about the two Iranian uranium enrichment facilities, located near the villages of Lashkar-Abad and Ramandeh about 40 kilometers west of Tehran.  Construction of both sites began in 2000 and they are close to completion, said council spokesman Alireza Jafarzadeh.  The sites, each containing several centrifuges, are heavily guarded, said council representative Soona Samsami. 

“The revelation of these two key sites and their function in the mullahs’ nuclear setup [has] exposed new dimensions of just how far they have advanced along the perilous path to the acquisition of the nuclear bomb,” Samsami said.

The council is the political arm of the People’s Mujahedin, also known as Mujahedin-e Khalq, which the U.S. State Department has formally identified as a terrorist organization.  Mujahedin-e Khalq is a Marxist-influenced group that conducted terrorist attacks in the 1970s that killed U.S. military and civilian personnel in Iran, has a long history of attacks against the Iranian clerical regime and advocates a secular government, according to a Federation of American Scientists fact sheet.

The Lashkar-Abad and Ramandeh sites are designed to complement a larger uranium enrichment facility near the city of Natanz, the existence of which the council disclosed last year, Samsami said (see GSN, May 9).  These sites are also intended to replace the Natanz facility in case it is attacked pre-emptively in an action similar to the 1981 Israeli air force operation, which destroyed Iraq’s Osiraq nuclear reactor.  The new facilities were also intended to operate clandestinely if Iran were forced to close Natanz because of increased international intervention, she said. 

The development of smaller nuclear-related sites, such as those in Lashkar-Abad and Ramandeh, is part of a two-fold strategy to help ensure the survivability of Iran’s nuclear program by adding a redundancy aspect, according to Samsami.  This strategy also includes the “showcasing” of the Bushehr nuclear reactor, currently being constructed for Iran by Russia, and using the public attention the Bushehr project receives to help provide cover for the development of other sites, Samsami said.

The information concerning the two new uranium enrichment sites was obtained through “highly placed” People’s Mujahedin of Iran sources within Iran, Samsami said, adding that similar sources have previously provided information on Iran’s biological weapons and ballistic missile programs (see GSN, May 16).

A senior U.N. official was quoted today by the New York Times as praising the information the council has previously released.

“This organization has been extremely on the mark in the past,” the U.N. official said.  “They are a group that seems to be privy to very solid and insider information,” the official added.

Both the Lashkar-Abad site and the Ramandeh site are operated by the Noor-Afza-Gostar Company, one of several alleged front companies employed by the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, Samsami said.  The company’s board of directors includes Reza Aghazadeh, AEO director general; Jamshid Sabbaghzadeh, the company’s chief executive officer and an adviser to Aghazadeh; and Mohammad Saeedi, deputy CEO and head of the AEO’s international affairs department, according to Samsami.  The fact that several senior AEO officials sit on the board of the Noor-Afza-Gostar Company indicates the importance of the company to Iran’s nuclear efforts, Samsami said.

The council has made its information on the Ramandeh and Lashkar-Abad nuclear sites — which includes the exact addresses of both — available to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Bush administration, Jafarzadeh said,  urging the IAEA to move quickly to immediately inspect the two sites before they could be modified.

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Iran II:  Russia Plans to Continue Nuclear Assistance

Russia will continue to build an Iranian nuclear power plant in Bushehr, CNN.com reported today (see GSN, May 23).

“Russia does not see any reason now to review its stance and its role regarding construction of the first nuclear reactor,” said Russian Atomic Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev.  “We will continue to fulfill our duties despite the fact that our position on this question is different to Washington’s official view,” he added (Reuters/CNN.com, May 27).

Iran has said it has the right to a nuclear energy program and maintained that it will continue its nuclear development.  Iranian President Mohammed Khatami said restrictions on its international trade must be dropped before Iran would agree to additional inspections by the the International Atomic Energy Agency (Mark Forbes, Sydney Morning Herald, May 27).

The European Union is also increasing pressure on Iran to drop its alleged nuclear weapons program, an effort that Iran denies.  Union officials said they could use trade negotiations to pressure Tehran, the Financial Times reported.

“We have to combine our approaches and work more sympathetically to get a clear message to Iran that it is in their interests to change,” said Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou (Judy Dempsey, Financial Times, May 27).

U.S. lawmakers said Sunday that Washington must exert pressure to depose Iran’s government, but not by force.

“Isolating the bad guys and taking the levers of power away from them is what’s got to happen,” said Representative Peter Goss (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, during an interview on CBS’ Face the Nation (William Mann, Associated Press/Chicago Tribune, May 26).

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North Korea:  Pyongyang Might Be Softening, South Korean Official Says

North Korea might be ready to negotiate a deal to resolve the nuclear standoff on Korean Peninsula, South Korea’s top foreign policy adviser said recently (see GSN, May 23).

Ban Ki-moon said there are signs that North Korea is taking a softer stance on nuclear talks.  North Korea’s failing economy also leaves Pyongyang with little choice but to negotiate, according to Ban.

“The only way or option available to them is to negotiate with the international community with whatever they might have,” he said (Channel NewsAsia, May 27).

South Korean Vice Minister for Finance and Economy Kim Gwang-lim said Seoul would slow food deliveries to the North if Pyongyang escalated the current standoff.  During inter-Korean talks on economic cooperation last week, South Korea agreed to provide its neighbor with 400,000 tons of rice this year to help ease chronic food shortages in the impoverished North.

Asked by lawmakers if rice shipments would continue if cross-border relations deteriorated, Kim said “the government would then have to adjust the speed of delivering the rice” (Sang-hun Choe, Associated Press/San Francisco Chronicle, May 27).

Seoul’s ambassador to Washington, meanwhile, said there is no chance of one-on-one talks between North Korea and the United States.  Last Saturday, North Korea indicated it was willing to accept multilateral talks after direct talks with the United States.

“There is no possibility of Washington accepting bilateral talks (with Pyongyang),” said Han Sung-joo.  “The United States finds it difficult to deal with Pyongyang in a bilateral setting because the nuclear concern affects Seoul, Tokyo and Beijing,” he added (Seo Hyun-jin, Korea Herald, May 27).

Bush, Koizumi Show United Front

A nuclear North Korea is unacceptable to U.S. President George W. Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, the pair said during last week’s Texas summit.

“We will not at all tolerate the possession, the development or the transfer of nuclear weapons by North Korea.  North Korea must promptly and completely dismantle all nuclear weapons development programs in a verifiable manner,” Koizumi said (White House transcript, May 27).

North Korea warned, however, that Japan will “meet a fatal fiasco” if it continues to walk in lockstep with Washington, Channel NewsAsia reported.

“The Japanese authorities are well advised to bear in mind that if they continue acting blindly to the tune of the U.S. out of their senses, they will only meet a fatal fiasco,” according to the Korean Central News Agency (Channel NewsAsia II, May 27).

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Russia:  Moscow to Launch Converted SS-19 ICBM June 30

Russia is scheduled to conduct a group satellite launch June 30 using a converted SS-19 ballistic missile, a spokesman for the Khrunichev space center said last week (see GSN, May 19).  The launch of the Rokot space launch vehicle, set to take place at the Plesetsk cosmodrome, will deliver eight satellites into orbit (ITAR-Tass, May 22 in FBIS-SOV, May 23).

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United States:  Army Finds Buried Bacteria Vials in Waste Dump

Officials have discovered several vials of biological agents buried at the U.S. Army’s former biological weapons research facility at Fort Detrick, Md., the Washington Post reported today (see GSN, May 23).

Fort Detrick officials believed they were removing industrial waste from a former biological weapons research center, but workers have discovered more than 100 vials, some containing Brucella melitensis, Klebsiella pneumoniae and Bacillus anthracis, a nonvirulent form of anthrax.

“You find it, contain it, and try to figure out what it is,” said Col. John Ball, Fort Detrick’s garrison commander.  “We’re learning, but it’s expensive,” he added.

Workers are operating in a sealed tent at the excavation site and wear biohazard suits.  Piles of buried debris occasionally explode, and Army officials have equipped bulldozers with blast shields, the Post reported.  Technicians remove large waste from the soil, mash the remaining dirt and waste and then douse it with bleach to kill bacteria.

Hubert Kaempf, an 83-year-old who supervised Fort Detrick’s waste haulers decades ago, defended the facility.

“We had one of the finest safety departments in the world,” he said.  “But what was in keeping with safety and sanitary laws then would now be very much forbidden,” he added (Elizabeth Williamson, Washington Post, May 27).

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Anthrax:  U.S. Postal Service to Expand Testing of Anthrax Detection System

The U.S. Postal Service plans next week to expand testing of a new system designed to detect the presence of biological agents, according to the Washington Post (see GSN, April 10).

The biohazard detection system (BDS) has been successfully tested over the past nine months in Baltimore, said Thomas Day, vice president of engineering for the Postal Service.  Beginning June 1, the system will be tested at 14 additional postal facilities throughout the country for 30 days, after which time postal officials will decide whether the system should be deployed at all postal sites, the Post reported.

“In approximately 30 days, we’ll have the results of various test sites and hopefully, this will lead to the validation of the new BDS system, Day said.

The BDS works by testing the air surrounding mail-handling equipment for anthrax particles using a rapid on-site DNA test, Day said.  If a positive match is detected, the network computer will provide immediate notification and an emergency response plan would then be activated (Michael Zimmerman, Washington Post, May 26).

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China:  Beijing Denies U.S. Missile Export Charges

China criticized Friday the U.S. decision to impose sanctions on the state-owned North China Industries Corporation (Norinco) for allegedly aiding Iran’s ballistic missile efforts (see GSN, May 24).

The sanctions, which took effect May 9, prohibit Norinco from entering into contracts with the United States or importing goods into the country for two years.  In addition, the U.S. State Department has also suspended all defense-related export licenses for the company.

“The United States is imposing its national policies on others, and the implementation of sanctions is entirely unreasonable,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

In its statement, the ministry said that Chinese missile-related export controls were being effectively enforced and denied that Norinco had aided the Iranian missile program (see GSN, Sept. 3, 2002).

“The Chinese government has consistently carried out measures to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them, and opposes any method used by any organization to engage in their spread,” the ministry said.  “The related Norinco company has not supplied any assistance to the relevant project in Iran,” it said (John Pomfret, Washington Post, May 24).

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U.S. Plans:  Classified Document Cites North Korea as Missile Threat

U.S. President George W. Bush cited North Korea as a missile threat to the United States in a classified document justifying a national ballistic missile defense system, the Washington Times reported today (see GSN, May 21).

Bush signed the classified document, National Security Presidential Directive-23, in December and the White House released an unclassified fact sheet on the directive last week.  The unclassified document, however, does not make direct reference to North Korea.

“Some states, such as North Korea, are aggressively pursuing the development of weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles as a means of coercing the United States and our allies,” the classified presidential directive says.

The United States will seek to field the missile defense system in 2004 and upgrade missile defense capabilities in 2005.

“In addition, the United States will seek permission respectively from the (United Kingdom) and Denmark to upgrade early warning radar in Fylingdales and Thule, Greenland, as part of our capability,” the directive says (see GSN, Feb. 6 and April 25).  The directive also instructs the secretaries of state and defense to “promote international missile defense cooperation” within military alliances, the Times reported (see GSN, May 23; Bill Gertz, Washington Times, May 27).

Silo Construction Underway in Alaska

Meanwhile, construction is underway on several missile silos at Fort Greely in Alaska, the Washington Post reported today (see GSN, Dec. 18, 2002).  The silos are part of the Bush administration’s efforts to deploy limited national missile defenses beginning next year.

Workers have been lowering steel cylinders into recently dug 80-foot-deep holes at the facility, according to the Post.  Technicians are also lining the walls of the new facility’s buildings with steel plates, in part to protect against the electromagnetic effects of a high-altitude nuclear blast.

Officials at Fort Greely have identified 13,000 separate tasks that need to be completed before Sept. 30, 2004, when the base is scheduled to be operational (Bradley Graham, Washington Post, May 27).

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Russia:  Surface-to-Air Missile System Could be Base for European Missile Defense, Russian General Says

Recent tests have demonstrated that the Russian Triumph S-400 surface-to-air missile system is capable of defending an area the size of a European country from a missile attack, Russian Army Gen. Anatoly Kornukov said last week (see GSN, May 15).  The system could also serve as the base for a European nonstrategic missile defense, Kornukov said (ITAR-Tass, May 22 in FBIS-SOV, May 23).

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