Frontline Pakistan : The Struggle With Militant Islam - Arz-e-Pak
Frontline Pakistan : The Struggle With Militant Islam - Arz-e-Pak
Frontline Pakistan : The Struggle With Militant Islam - Arz-e-Pak
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Rogue in the Ranks<br />
State, Richard Armitage, all but named Dr Khan, when he expressed<br />
concerns that ‘people who were employed by the nuclear agency<br />
and have retired’ might be spreading nuclear technology to North<br />
Korea. 22<br />
During his visit to <strong>Islam</strong>abad in the summer of 2002, the US Secretary<br />
of State, Colin Powell, was said to have asked President Musharraf<br />
to arrest Dr Khan for questioning over the alleged secret trading of<br />
<strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong>’s nuclear technology to North Korea. He also offered US<br />
assistance in investigating into the matter. 23 Musharraf had already<br />
sidelined Dr Khan, but he was not prepared to take that extreme step<br />
against the country’s most revered personality, largely because of fear<br />
of a public backlash. Musharraf later told the New York Times that<br />
he had suspected for at least three years that Dr Khan was sharing<br />
nuclear technology with other countries, but argued that the USA had<br />
not given him convincing proof.<br />
<strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong>’s link with the North Korean nuclear programme, however,<br />
ran much deeper and was much more complicated. <strong>The</strong> defence<br />
cooperation between the two nations started in 1994, when Prime<br />
Minister Benazir Bhutto visited Pyongyang to negotiate a missile deal<br />
with the North Korean leaders. Benazir Bhutto’s father, <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong>’s<br />
former Prime Minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, had had a lasting friendship<br />
with the founder of the North Korean communist regime, Kim Il Sung.<br />
<strong>The</strong>re was huge respect for the daughter of <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong>’s first elected<br />
leader. She was persuaded by the military leadership to go and see the<br />
North Korean leader, Kim Jong. <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong> desperately needed a nuclear<br />
missile system at that point to counter India’s threat; US sanctions on<br />
military hardware sales had also fuelled the urgency of this need.<br />
Benazir Bhutto denied that <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong> had traded nuclear technology<br />
for the missiles. But there was huge scepticism over whether <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong>,<br />
with its economy in a slump, would have enough money to pay the<br />
North Koreans. Benazir Bhutto has often said that the USA conspired<br />
in the ousting of her second government because of the missile deal<br />
with North Korea. 24<br />
Nonetheless, the deal provided Dr Khan with an opportunity to<br />
make a breakthrough with the North Koreans. He visited North Korea<br />
13 times over the next seven years. During those visits, Pyongyang<br />
offered to exchange centrifuge equipment for its missile technology,<br />
enabling <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong> to extend the reach of its nuclear weapon deep<br />
inside India. North Korean scientists received nuclear briefings at<br />
KRL, although even top <strong><strong>Pak</strong>istan</strong>i civilian leaders were not allowed<br />
1