[Vision2020] 10-12-04 CNN: U.N. agency: Nuclear materials vanish in Iraq

[Art Deco aka W. Fox]

U.N. agency: Nuclear materials vanish in Iraq
Tuesday, October 12, 2004 Posted: 11:06 AM EDT (1506 GMT)

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- Equipment and materials that could be used to make 
nuclear weapons have disappeared from Iraq, warns the chief of the atomic 
watchdog agency for the United Nations.
Satellite imagery shows buildings that once housed high-precision equipment that 
could be used to make nuclear bombs have been dismantled, the International 
Atomic Energy Agency said in a letter to the U.N. Security Council.

In the letter, IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei said that though some 
radioactive equipment taken from Iraq after the war's start has shown up in 
other countries, none of the missing high-quality, dual-use equipment or 
materials has been found.

The American government prevented U.N. weapons inspectors from returning to 
Iraq -- thereby blocking the IAEA from monitoring the high-tech equipment and 
materials -- after the U.S.-led war was launched in March 2003.

"The kind of equipment we're talking about ... is the sort of thing that has a 
multitude of industrial applications," said IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozdecky in a 
phone interview from the agency's headquarters in Vienna, Austria.

"We were satisfied when we were in Iraq that it was not being used for a nuclear 
weapons program. In the wrong hands, it could be turned to the use in a nuclear 
weapons program. Until we establish that this material is in responsible hands, 
we have to treat it as a serious proliferation concern."

IAEA monitors left Iraq shortly before the U.S. invasion. Since then, the Bush 
administration turned down IAEA offers to return, while the United Nations has 
been hesitant to put any of its staff into a dangerous Iraq.

IAEA inspectors traveled to Iraq in August for the agency's twice-yearly 
physical inventory of nuclear material, which consists mostly of yellow cake 
(enriched uranium), a spokeswoman said.

Except for an amount the United States notified the agency it was removing, the 
IAEA verified that the yellow cake remaining in Iraq was the same as before the 
war.

However, the equipment is another matter. Under a mandate from the United 
Nations, Iraq is obliged to notify the IAEA if at any time it moves any of the 
equipment in question.

"We've not received any such notification since the war," Gwozdecky said. "Until 
we learn from either Iraq or any country that might have received or have 
knowledge about where this material went, we have a concern on our hands."

Last week's release of the CIA report by chief U.S. weapons inspector Charles 
Duelfer showed that some equipment could have been taken during the chaos and 
looting that followed the invasion, Gwozdecky said.

"But from our satellite photos, we've seen evidence that some of the facilities 
we used to monitor closely have been dismantled completely," he said, indicating 
that it happened over a longer period of time with more forethought. "We need to 
answer the question, 'Where did this material go?' "

Since March 2003, the nuclear agency has had to rely on satellite imagery to 
work out what is happening with Iraq's nuclear sites.

In his letter, ElBaradei added that "as the disappearance of such equipment and 
materials may be of proliferation significance, any state that has information 
about the location of such items should provide IAEA with that information."

A spokesman for the U.S. Mission in New York said he had not seen ElBaradei's 
letter.

In the first presidential debate, President Bush and Sen. John Kerry agreed that 
nuclear proliferation is the single most serious threat facing the United 
States.

Bush has justified the war in Iraq in part by saying that former Iraqi leader 
Saddam Hussein was on the brink of developing a nuclear bomb that he might use 
against the United States or give to terrorists.

But the Duelfer report concluded that Hussein terminated his nuclear program 
after the Persian Gulf War in 1991.

CNN's Lauren Rivera contributed to this report.
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