Nuclear scientist says bomb saved Pakistan

ISLAMABD: The father of Pakistan’s nuclear bomb has vigorously defended the program as sparing his country the fate of Iraq or Libya, amid signs that Islamabad is ramping up its weapons capacities.

Writing in Newsweek magazine, Abdul Qadeer Khan said that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons had prevented war with historic rival India, which he accused of pursuing a “massive program” due to ambitions of superpower status.

“Don’t overlook the fact that no nuclear-capable country has been subjected to aggression or occupied, or had its borders redrawn. Had Iraq and Libya been nuclear powers, they wouldn’t have been destroyed in the way we have seen recently,” Khan said.

Khan also argued that Bangladesh would not have won independence in 1971 if Pakistan had nuclear weapons. India supported Bangladesh’s independence, which came after a nine-month struggle that was harshly put down by Pakistani forces.

Many Pakistanis regard Khan as a hero for building the Islamic world’s first nuclear bomb. India and Pakistan carried out nuclear tests in 1998.

He admitted in 2004 that he ran a nuclear black-market selling secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea. But Khan later retracted his remarks and in 2009 was freed from house arrest, although he was asked to keep a low profile.

Western powers in March launched a military campaign against Libya over concerns of violence against civilians. Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi agreed in 2003 to end his nuclear program and tried to reconcile with the West.

Pakistan has been increasingly worried about its nuclear program after US forces on May 2 managed to enter the country covertly to kill the world’s most wanted man, Osama bin Laden, who was living in the garrison city of Abbottabad.

Khan lashed out at Pakistanis who contend that the country, which suffers grinding poverty and receives billions of dollars in US assistance each year, cannot afford its nuclear program.

“The propaganda about spending exorbitant sums on the nuclear program circulated by ignorant, often foreign-paid, Pakistanis has no substance,” he wrote.

But Khan also said that Pakistan’s “incompetent and ignorant rulers” never devoted enough resources to development, which he argued should have been easier due to the protection ensure by nuclear weapons.

While Khan said he was not familiar with the latest developments in Pakistan’s nuclear program, Newsweek published a commercial satellite image that appeared to show expedited construction at the country’s Khushab nuclear site.

The Institute for Science and International Security, which assessed the image, said it showed “significant progress” on a fourth reactor. A frame of a building was now visible, which did not appear in a picture taken in January.

The Washington-based think-tank said that plutonium from the new reactors would allow a “dramatic increase” in production, potentially allowing Pakistan to double its annual production of nuclear weapons.

Pakistan is the sole country blocking talks in the Conference of Disarmament that would lead to an international agreement banning production of new nuclear bomb-making material.

Pakistan said that Senator John Kerry, on a mission to Islamabad to ease tensions in the wake of bin Laden’s killing, assured Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani that the United States had no designs on taking over the country’s nuclear arsenal.

“He said that he can write this with his blood, that we have no interest in Pakistan’s nuclear assets,” Gilani’s office said in a statement.

But the statement quoted Kerry as hoping that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons would be “well-protected and secure” under a “proper command and control system.”

Iran agrees to discuss its nuclear program

TEHRAN: Iran has agreed to discuss its nuclear program at a meeting next week in Geneva, but President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the Islamic Republic won’t make “one iota” of concessions about its nuclear rights.

The European Union says Saeed Jalili, Iran’s top nuclear negotiator, will meet with EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton on Dec. 6 and 7 — the first talks in a year after negotiations bogged down.

Ashton’s office says she will act “on behalf” of the U.S., China, Russia, France, Britain and Germany.

Ahmadinejad said Tuesday that his country is ready to enter nuclear talks with the world powers under “equal” conditions.

The United States and its allies say Iran is seeking to build a nuclear bomb. Tehran denies that.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is

U.S thinking military options on Iran

WASHINGTON: The United States needs to be realistic about its efforts to engage Iran, whose leaders are lying about Tehran’s nuclear program and are on a path to building nuclear weapons, the top U.S. military officer said.

Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in comments released on Friday that the U.S. military has been thinking about military options on Iran “for a significant period of time” but added that diplomacy remained the focus of U.S. efforts.

“I still think it’s important we focus on the dialogue, we focus on the engagement, but also do it in a realistic way that looks at whether Iran is actually going to tell the truth, actually engage and actually do anything,” Mullen said in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS due to air on Sunday.

Iran has agreed to meet with a representative of the six big powers over its

Obama calls Ahmadinejads remarks on 9/11 as hateful

US President Barack Obama on Friday condemned as hateful, offensive and inexcusable a suggestion by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of a US government role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Obama, in an interview with a television channel, lashed out at Ahmadinejad for the latest of what the White House called a long list of outrageous comments that would deepen Tehran’s isolation from the international community. It was offensive. It was hateful, Obama said according to interview excerpts released by the White House. And particularly for him to make the statement here in Manhattan, just a little north of Ground Zero, where families lost their loved ones for him to make a statement like that was inexcusable. The United States and its Western allies are locked in a standoff with Iran over its nuclear program, which Washington believes aims to produce atomic weapons but which Tehran says is for solely peaceful purposes. The standoff has seen sanctions imposed on Tehran, a course of action Obama blames on the action of the Iranian government. Now I think it is very important to understand that the sanctions that arose this year had to do with the fact that alone among signatories to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, Iran has not been able to convince the international community that it’s nuclear programme is peaceful, he said.

Obama calls Ahmadinejads remarks on 9/11 as hateful

US President Barack Obama on Friday condemned as hateful, offensive and inexcusable a suggestion by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of a US government role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Obama, in an interview with a television channel, lashed out at Ahmadinejad for the latest of what the White House called a long list of outrageous comments that would deepen Tehran’s isolation from the international community. It was offensive. It was hateful, Obama said according to interview excerpts released by the White House. And particularly for him to make the statement here in Manhattan, just a little north of Ground Zero, where families lost their loved ones for him to make a statement like that was inexcusable. The United States and its Western allies are locked in a standoff with Iran over its nuclear program, which Washington believes aims to produce atomic weapons but which Tehran says is for solely peaceful purposes. The standoff has seen sanctions imposed on Tehran, a course of action Obama blames on the action of the Iranian government. Now I think it is very important to understand that the sanctions that arose this year had to do with the fact that alone among signatories to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, Iran has not been able to convince the international community that it’s nuclear programme is peaceful, he said.

Obama calls Ahmadinejads remarks on 9/11 as hateful

US President Barack Obama on Friday condemned as hateful, offensive and inexcusable a suggestion by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of a US government role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Obama, in an interview with a television channel, lashed out at Ahmadinejad for the latest of what the White House called a long list of outrageous comments that would deepen Tehran’s isolation from the international community. It was offensive. It was hateful, Obama said according to interview excerpts released by the White House. And particularly for him to make the statement here in Manhattan, just a little north of Ground Zero, where families lost their loved ones for him to make a statement like that was inexcusable. The United States and its Western allies are locked in a standoff with Iran over its nuclear program, which Washington believes aims to produce atomic weapons but which Tehran says is for solely peaceful purposes. The standoff has seen sanctions imposed on Tehran, a course of action Obama blames on the action of the Iranian government. Now I think it is very important to understand that the sanctions that arose this year had to do with the fact that alone among signatories to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, Iran has not been able to convince the international community that it’s nuclear programme is peaceful, he said.

Netanyahu is a serial killer: Ahmadinejad

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lashed out at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and called him a skilled killer in an interview with CNN’s Larry King Live.
When asked to comment on Netanyahu’s declaration that a nuclear Iran is the greatest threat facing humanity, the Iranian president shrugged off the statement, saying Netanyahu is nothing but a skilled killer.Netanyahu should be put on trial for killing Palestinians for putting Gaza under siege. He should be put on trial for killing women and children, said Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad insisted that the international sanctions imposed on Iran are not hurting his country, and maintained his claim that Iran isn’t interested in developing nuclear weapons, instead, he deflected the focus on the United States and Israel’s nuclear program. Both the Zionist regime and the United States government should be disarmed, he said. The threat to the world are the bombs that the U.S. government and the Zionist regime have. We have no interested in atomic weapons, said the Iranian president. We do not think that is useful. The US and key Western allies fear Iran could try to process its low enriched uranium into highly enriched uranium, which could be used to make an atomic weapon. Iran insists its nuclear program is purely peaceful, aimed solely at producing nuclear energy. Iran has defied four rounds of increasingly restrictive economic sanctions aimed at compelling Tehran to prove it is not building a nuclear weapons program. Iran adamantly denies accusations from the US and its allies that it seeks atomic arms. Ahmadinejad is scheduled to speak Thursday at the UN General Assembly’s annual ministerial meeting in New York.

Iran could have nukes ready by 2012: CIA

WASHINGTON: Iran has enough low-enriched uranium to make two weapons, which it could have prepared and ready for delivery as early as 2012, CIA director Leon Panetta said Sunday.

“We think they have enough low-enriched uranium for two weapons,” Panetta told the ABC network”s “This Week” program.

Tehran would need a year to enrich it fully to produce a bomb and it would take “another year to develop the kind of weapon delivery system in order to make that viable,” he said.

Iran is under mounting international pressure over its suspect nuclear program, which the West fears masks a covert weapons drive.

The Islamic republic vehemently denies the charge, but has been flexing its military muscle mainly in the strategic Gulf region by staging regular war games and showcasing an array of Iran-made missiles.

“There is a continuing debate right now about whether or not they ought to proceed with a bomb. But they clearly are developing their nuclear capability and that raises concerns,” Panetta said. “Just exactly what are their intentions?”

Neither the United States nor its top regional ally Israel, the sole if undeclared nuclear-armed power in the Middle East, have ruled out a military strike to curb Iran”s atomic drive.

“Israel is very concerned about what”s happening in Iran,” Panetta noted.

“We continue to share intelligence (with Israel) as to what exactly is Iran”s capacity,” Panetta told ABC, but added that Israel is “willing to give us the room to be able to try to change Iran diplomatically and culturally and politically.”

Israel, he said, feels “more strongly that Iran has already made the decision to proceed with te bomb, but at the same time they know that sanctions will have an impact.”

Reacting to Panetta”s warning about Iran being close to building an atomic bomb, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said there was cause for concern.

“This information has to be checked but such information is always worrying and all the more so because the international community does not recognize the Iranian nuclear program as transparent,” he told reporters at the G20 summit in Toronto.

“If this is proved, it would make the situation even more tense,” Medvedev said, adding that Russia might need to re-examine its position on the matter.

Russia, which unlike the United States has diplomatic ties with Iran, has in the past been reluctant to impose tough sanctions but backed the latest UN move following Tehran”s repeated defiance of orders to halt uranium enrichment.

The US Congress this week endorsed a sweeping package of tough new energy and financial sanctions on Tehran over the program, and on June 10 the UN Security Council adopted resolution 1929, which imposes military and financial sanctions on Iran aiming to rein in the suspect nuclear drive.

The new US measures being sent to President Barack Obama for his signature, piled atop the UN Security Council and European sanctions, are aimed to choke off Iran”s access to imports of refined petroleum products like gasoline and jet fuel and curb its access to the international banking system.

The bill would also shut US markets to firms that provide Iran with refined petroleum products that the oil-rich nation must import to meet demand because of a weak domestic refining capability, and takes aim at firms that invest in Iran”s energy sector, including non-US companies that provide financing, insurance, or shipping services.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has lashed out at the international community in the wake of sanctions, charging that the UN Security Council has become an “oppressive tool” of world powers.

In an outburst earlier this month against the Security Council for imposing the new round of sanctions, the hardline president said the UN body had failed to resolve any key world issues, including conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“We continue to urge them to engage in peaceful use of nuclear power,” Panetta said Sunday.

“If they did that, they wouldn”t have these concerns, they wouldn”t have these problems. The international community would be working with them instead of having them work on their own.”

At a G8 meet in Canada meanwhile world leaders urged Iran to hold a “transparent dialogue” over its nuclear program, as Ahmadinejad prepared to unveil his conditions for talks.

Iran may withdraw from nuclear deal: Larijani

Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani warned that if the western powers do not accept Irans right to the access of nuclear technology for civilian purpose then Iran would not abide by the agreement to send much of its enriched uranium to Turkey for further enrichment, if the G51 powers negotiating with Iran over its nuclear program do not approve it in its entirety.
If the powers including the US, UK, France, Russia and China seek to lay any further conditions on Iran beyond those negotiated with Brazil and Turkey, Larijani said, Teheran would withdraw from the deal.

Preparations ahead of Hunza Lake spill

HUNZA: The surging water at landslide-made artificial lake at Hunza river, spreading to more areas as local authorities finalizing preparations for transfer of the threatened population to safer places.

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Preparations ahead of Hunza Lake spill

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