International investigators and western intelligence have for the first time named Sudan as a major conduit for sophisticated engineering equipment that could be used in nuclear weapons programmes.
Hundreds of millions of dollars of equipment was imported into the African country over a three-year period before the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington in 2001 and has since disappeared, according to Guardian sources.
Western governments, United Nations detectives and international analysts trying to stem the illicit trade in weapons of mass destruction technology are alarmed by the black market trade.
A European intelligence assessment obtained by The Guardian says Sudan has been using front companies and third countries to import machine tools, gauges and hi-tech processing equipment from Western Europe for its military industries in recent years.
But it says that Sudan is also being used as a conduit, as much of the equipment is too sophisticated for use in the country itself.
”The suspicion arises that at least some of the machinery was not destined for or not only destined for Sudan,” the assessment says. ”Among the equipment purchased by Sudan there are dual-use goods whose use in Sudan appears implausible because of their high technological standard.”
Western analysts and intelligence agencies suspect the equipment has been or is being traded by the nuclear proliferation racket headed by the Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, who admitted nuclear trading two years ago and is under house arrest in Islamabad.
Khan is known to have visited Sudan at least once between 1998 and 2002, and the suspicion is he may have used the country as a warehouse for the hi-tech engineering equipment he was selling to Libya, Iran and North Korea for the assembly of centrifuges for enriching uranium, the most common way of building a nuclear bomb.
Sudan has been ravaged by internal conflicts for decades, and has until recently been governed by an Islamist regime.
Analysts point out that a ”failing state” such as Sudan is an ideal candidate for the illicit trading.
David Albright, who is investigating the various players in the Khan network and tracks nuclear proliferation for the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, said about $35-million worth of dual-use engineering equipment was imported by Sudan between 1999 and 2001.
The purchases were denominated in German marks (before the introduction of the euro), suggesting that at least some of the equipment came from Germany.
Investigators say the machinery has not been found in Sudan. Nor has it been found in Libya, since Tripoli gave up its secret nuclear bomb project in December 2003. Given Osama bin Laden’s long relationship with Sudan, where he lived before moving to Afghanistan, there had been suspicions of al-Qaeda involvement. But the goods have not been found in Afghanistan either.
”A huge amount of dual-use equipment was bought by Sudan and people don’t know where it went to,” Albright said. ”It’s a big mystery. The equipment has not been found anywhere.”
A senior international investigator confirmed that Sudan had been importing the material and that the transports had ceased in 2001.
”No one now seems to be buying to that extent,” he said. ”Perhaps the activity stopped because they got all that they needed.”
While the Khan operation is a main suspect, Iran is also suspected of being behind the Sudanese dealings.
”There is the Khan network and then there is a much bigger network in this, and that is the Iranian network,” the investigator said.
On Wednesday, The Guardian reported that the same European intelligence assessment — which draws on material gathered by British, French, German and Belgian agencies — concluded that the Iranian government had been successfully scouring Europe for the sophisticated equipment needed to build a nuclear bomb.
Western intelligence and Albright identified a state-owned firm in Khartoum as a ”pivotal organisation” in Sudan’s procurement of weapons and dual-use technology in eastern and western Europe and Russia.
The named company has offices in Tehran, Moscow, Sofia, Istanbul and Beijing. According to the European intelligence assessment, the company ”is cooperating intensively with Iran”.
”It is striking,” says the document, ”that [the company’s] partners are enterprises subordinate to Iran’s Defence Industries Organisation. Technology transfer between these two states and links between their programmes cannot be ruled out.”
While the machinery was dual-use, meaning that it could be used in civil or military applications, Albright said he understood the equipment was ”nuclear-related”.
”For the people following this, the interest is whether it’s nuclear. The assumption is it is.”
The likelihood that the machinery was for Sudan is slim, say experts and investigators.
”The idea that Sudan could buy and make use of extremely sophisticated nuclear technology is obviously a question mark,” said Jon Wolfsthal, a nuclear proliferation expert at Washington’s Centre for Strategic and International Studies.
Sudan is known to have a small civilian nuclear programme, researching nuclear medicine, radiological safety and food irradiation techniques.
Never before has it been suspected of involvement in nuclear weapons research, however. It signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty in 2004. – Guardian Unlimited Â