Pakistan has expanded an investigation of its top nuclear weapons laboratory, detaining up to seven scientists and administrators amid allegations sensitive technology may have spread to Iran, North Korea and Libya, officials say.
Pakistan has strongly denied any official involvement in sharing technology to those countries but has acknowledged that individual scientists acting on their own account may leaked information.
Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said Sunday that over the past few days between five and seven personnel at the Khan Research Laboratories were taken in for questioning. But he said the detained men were not "necessarily involved in something or have allegations against them."
Among the detained was Islam-ul Haq, a director at the laboratory, who was picked up Saturday as he was dining at the residence of the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, Abdul Qadeer Khan.
The laboratory is named after Khan, a national hero for leading Pakistan to its underground test of the Islamic world's first nuclear bomb in 1998. The bomb was designed as a deterrent to Pakistan's nuclear-armed neighbor, India. Haq is Khan's principal staff officer.
Haq's wife, Nilofar Islam, said Khan told her that her husband was detained but "we have had no contact with him. We don't know where he is and what he is being asked."
The nuclear program investigations came as Pakistan intensifies crackdowns as part of the US-led war on terror, most recently arresting seven suspected al-Qaeda militants on Sunday and seizing a weapons cache in the teeming port city of Karachi.
During the past two months, Pakistan has interrogated a handful of scientists at the laboratory, acting on information about Iran's nuclear program from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN watchdog, officials say.
Khan has also been questioned, although he has not been detained and is still treated as an official dignitary in Pakistan.
Earlier this month, US Secretary of State Colin Powell said American officials have presented evidence to Pakistan's leaders of Pakistani involvement in the spread of nuclear weapons technology.
The Jan. 2 arrest of South African-based businessman Asher Karni at a Denver airport, accused of smuggling nuclear bomb triggers to Pakistan, deepened suspicions of the country's involvement in the nuclear black market.
The New York Times also reported that sophisticated centrifuge design technology used to enrich uranium had been passed to Libya even after a pledge by President General Pervez Musharraf to rein in Pakistani scientists. Pakistan dismissed the allegation as "absolutely false."
Libya announced last month it was giving up its nuclear, biological and chemical weapons programs and pledged to name its suppliers.
US officials say many of the names probably will be Pakistani. They say evidence points to Pakistani nuclear experts as the source of at least some technology that Libya used; similar reports have arisen about probable Pakistani assistance to Iran.
Pakistan also has been accused of swapping nuclear technology to North Korea in return for missiles.
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
AT RISK: The council reiterated that people should seriously consider the necessity of visiting China, after Beijing passed 22 guidelines to punish ‘die-hard’ separatists The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has since Jan. 1 last year received 65 petitions regarding Taiwanese who were interrogated or detained in China, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. Fifty-two either went missing or had their personal freedoms restricted, with some put in criminal detention, while 13 were interrogated and temporarily detained, he said in a radio interview. On June 21 last year, China announced 22 guidelines to punish “die-hard Taiwanese independence separatists,” allowing Chinese courts to try people in absentia. The guidelines are uncivilized and inhumane, allowing Beijing to seize assets and issue the death penalty, with no regard for potential
‘UNITED FRONT’ FRONTS: Barring contact with Huaqiao and Jinan universities is needed to stop China targeting Taiwanese students, the education minister said Taiwan has blacklisted two Chinese universities from conducting academic exchange programs in the nation after reports that the institutes are arms of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) said in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) published yesterday. China’s Huaqiao University in Xiamen and Quanzhou, as well as Jinan University in Guangzhou, which have 600 and 1,500 Taiwanese on their rolls respectively, are under direct control of the Chinese government’s political warfare branch, Cheng said, citing reports by national security officials. A comprehensive ban on Taiwanese institutions collaborating or
RSS