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| Axis of Evil |
| Iraq says scientists free to leave |
| 2002-12-27 |
| Iraq's top liaison with UN weapons inspectors said Thursday that scientists tapped for private questioning outside of Iraq were free to leave the country--although Iraq saw "no need" for secretive interviews. Gen. Hossam Mohammed Amin said for the first time that Iraq would not forbid scientists from meeting UN officials outside the country for interviews regarding nuclear, biological and chemical weapons programs now under scrutiny. He made equally clear, however, that Iraq would not encourage such cooperation. Sounds like a threat to me Amin repeatedly emphasized that he, as a scientist, would not leave Iraq for such interviews. "If there's an important question to be addressed, let them address to me here in Iraq," he said during a weekly briefing. "Why this complicated procedure? I don't believe in this process," the general added. Of course you don't, you want to live Iraq's grudging approval for out-of-country interviews came at the end of the first month since the resumption of inspections and as UN monitors await a list of Iraqi scientists linked to weapons programs. Amin said Thursday that the list would be ready within three days and would contain hundreds of names for possible UN investigation. The questioning of Iraqi scientists has become a critical barometer in the UN effort to verify whether Baghdad still harbors weapons of mass destruction more than a decade after losing in the Persian Gulf war. The UN teams have the authority to talk with scientists outside Iraq, apparently in search of a whistle-blower, but there are significant complications. Most notably, UN officials are unsure whether they can offer asylum to someone willing to talk but fearing reprisal from the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The U.S. has offered to do just that, but of course the U.N. might not recognise that as legit. Although the Bush administration had apparently been pressing UN officials to speed up the assessment--particularly the questioning of scientists--Iraqi officials said last week that UN monitors had not yet asked for any private interviews. That changed this week when inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the nuclear watchdog of the United Nations, went to confer with professor Sabah Abdulnoor, a former materials engineer for the Iraqi nuclear program now teaching at the University of Technology in Baghdad. Two IAEA investigators met with Abdulnoor at the Applied Science College and asked to speak to him privately. He refused, agreeing to talk only when an Iraqi official was brought into the meeting. Within a couple of hours after the inspectors left, Abdulnoor called a press conference to publicize his cooperation with the UN and his loyalty to the Iraqi government. "I know nothing. I said nothing, nothing!" Abdulnoor, in a lengthy private interview later that afternoon, said he had no interest in talking to the inspectors without a government representative even though he referred to one inspector, whom he had known since the early 1990s, as an "old mate." Scared to talk without his "minder" present The university teacher said the inspectors were keen, in their questions, on finding other members of the Iraqi nuclear team. Most of those people were no longer alive or working in weapons programs, he said. Note the "no longer alive" statement. There have been unconfirmed reports of Saddam having scientists who had worked on his WMD programs killed, along with their families. This may indicate that those reports are true. |
| Posted by:Steve |