The "father" of Pakistan's nuclear bomb was being questioned last night following reports of possible links between the Pakistani and Iranian nuclear programmes, Pakistan government officials said yesterday, writes Rahul Bedi in New Delhi.
A Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mr Masood Khan, said in Islamabad that Dr Abdul Qader Khan was being questioned by the Pakistan authorities in connection with the "debriefing" of several scientists working at the Khan Research Laboratories, a uranium enrichment plant near the Pakistan capital.
Employees at the laboratory named after Dr Khan, who is a national hero in Pakistan, are alleged to have links with Iran's clandestine nuclear programme.
International nuclear experts investigating Iran's atomic weapons programme have reportedly concluded that certain Pakistani scientists and companies provided blueprints, technical guidance and possibly even equipment to Tehran for a uranium-enrichment plant.
Iran recently averted a crisis with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations authorised nuclear watchdog, by agreeing to co-operate more fully with IAEA inspections.
Pakistan's information minister, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, acknowledged yesterday that "one or two scientists" were being questioned following media reports of possible links with Iran's nuclear programme.
Exchanging nuclear information with Iran would not be permitted under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Pakistan, a self-declared nuclear power since 1998, has not signed.
Pakistan became a key US ally after the September 11th terrorist attacks on New York and Washington and has denied persistently proliferating nuclear technology, especially to Iran. Any suggestion that Pakistan might be sharing nuclear secrets with Iran - one of President Bush's "axis-of-evil" states - would cause alarm in Washington when contrasted with last weekend's decision by Libya to renounce weapons of mass destruction and to co-operate with the IAEA.
The Pakistan government spokesman denied that Dr Khan was under detention. However, reports from Islamabad quoting an unnamed intelligence official claimed the FBI had also participated in the questioning of Dr Khan.
The IAEA has been investigating a possible nuclear link between Pakistan and Iran, after Tehran acknowledged using centrifuge designs that appear similar to the ones Islamabad used to develop its own atomic bomb.
At the weekend, the Pakistani government said Mr Yasin Chohan, one of three Khan Laboratories scientists detained, had been allowed to return home after undergoing a "personnel dependability and debriefing session" in connection with the Iran nuclear issue.
Two other scientists, Mr Mohammad Farooq and an other identified only as Saeed, were "still undergoing debriefing". Dr Khan was now part of this "debriefing" session.