KUALA LUMPUR, 21 February 2004 — Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan arranged enriched uranium to be sent to Libya and sold Iran nuclear centrifuge parts for $3 million in cash, Malaysian police said yesterday.
In a report throwing fresh light on a nuclear black market scandal, police cited evidence from suspected middleman Buhary Syed Abu Tahir, accused by Washington of helping Khan to sell illicit nuclear technology.
The report was issued after questioning Tahir over his involvement with Khan, the man dubbed the father of Pakistan’s nuclear bomb.
Tahir, a Sri Lankan resident in Malaysia, told police Khan asked him to send two containers of used centrifuge parts from Pakistan to Iran some time in 1994 or 1995.
“B.S.A. Tahir organized the transshipment of the two containers from Dubai to Iran using a merchant ship owned by a company in Iran,” police said in a report.
It said payment for the two containers of centrifuge units, amounting to about $3 million, was made by an unnamed Iranian.
“The cash was brought in two briefcases and kept in an apartment that was used as a guesthouse by the Pakistani nuclear arms expert each time he visited Dubai,” says the report, which identifies Khan as the arms expert.
Diplomats and arms experts have said they believe the scientist, who has admitted leaking nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea, offered Iran his centrifuge designs on the black market.
Tahir also told police how Libya, which has since renounced it is abandoning its weapons of mass destruction programs, got enriched uranium from Pakistan.
“Around 2001, the nuclear arms expert informed B.S.A. Tahir that a certain amount of UF6 (enriched uranium) was sent by air from Pakistan to Libya,” the report said.
Pakistan said it would look into the report if asked but declined to comment on specific details raised in the document.
“The government of Pakistan shall look into it (the detail of the report) if it is conveyed through official channels. Broadly speaking, Dr A.Q. Khan had in his statement confessed to these activities,” military spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan told Reuters.
A Malaysian intelligence source, who declined to be identified, said Tahir remained in the Malaysian capital.
“Tahir has moved out from his house but is still in the city,” said the source.
Malaysian police have said Tahir obtained the centrifuge components from SCOPE, part of a publicly listed company controlled by the Malaysian prime minister’s son, Kamaluddin Abdullah, and two other investors.
The Malaysian supplier, a unit of Scomi Group Bhd, has said the parts were ordered legitimately for oil and gas work.
Gas centrifuges spin at supersonic speeds to separate fissile uranium-235 from non-fissile uranium isotopes.
Experts say acquiring weapons-grade material is the biggest hurdle that countries seeking to make an atomic bomb must overcome.
