As Germany mounts the first prosecution targeting an international nuclear contraband ring, details are emerging of how South Africa was a key base for supplying pariah states.
Authorities as far afield as Malaysia, Switzerland, Germany, Pakistan and South Africa were jolted into action after October 2003 when a cargo ship, the BBC China, was searched at an Italian port in a United States-British intelligence operation.
On board was high-tech equipment bound for Libya’s secret nuclear weapons programme. Libyan leader Moammar Gadaffi struck a deal with the West: he renounced his nuclear ambitions and informed on his own suppliers.
In South Africa a frantic SMS was allegedly received: “The bird must be destroyed, feathers and all … They have fed us to the dogs.”
But the “bird” — the better part of a nuclear enrichment plant ordered by Libya — survived.
Seizure of this equipment in a September 2004 raid at a Vanderbijlpark engineering works was a major advance in investigations then raging across four continents.
Already by February 2004, the contraband network’s leader had confessed: Abdul Qadeer Khan, “father” of Pakistan’s nuclear bomb, publicly told how he had supplied nuclear technology to Libya, North Korea and Iran. He was stripped of his Cabinet status, but pardoned.
The network’s chief money man, Bughari Seyed Abu Tahir, was arrested in Malaysia, where he had arranged for the materiel found on the BBC China to be engineered by a company co-owned by the prime minister’s son. Tahir has not been tried, but has supplied information to investigators.
First to be arrested in South Africa, in September 2004, was Johan Meyer, co-owner of Tradefin Engineering, where the “bird” was manufactured and stowed. He agreed to turn prosecution witness. His alleged principals, German South African Gerhard Wisser and Swiss South African Daniel Geiges, were picked up by the police.
Wisser was MD of Krisch Engineering in Randburg and Geiges a director in his employ. They are awaiting trial, charged with contravening non-proliferation laws.
Geiges’s lawyer confirmed this week that he was negotiating a plea bargain with the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).
In Europe, Gotthard Lerch was arrested in Switzerland and extradited to his native Germany to stand trial. He has an extensive property portfolio in South Africa, managed by Wisser. Lerch’s lawyers have reportedly denied his guilt, claiming he is the victim of intelligence agencies’ shenanigans.
Lerch’s trial opened last Friday in Mannheim. It is expected that his links with South Africa will feature prominently. The charge sheet prepared by the NPA for its prosecution of Wisser and Geiges, and details obtained by Der Spiegel of the German investigation into Lerch, show how entwined the two matters are.
The South African charge sheet alleges Krisch Engineering, and specifically Wisser and Geiges, had worked on the apartheid nuclear programme. Among other things, a prototype valve supplied by German company Leybold Heraus — where Lerch worked — was “clandestinely exported” to South Africa. Leybold has previously refused to comment, saying it was cooperating with “relevant institutions”.
At this time, Wisser and Geiges got to know Tradefin’s Meyer, who worked on the same part of the apartheid programme.
The charge sheet makes surprising new claims of proliferation from South Africa to nuclear pariah states.
In the late 1980s, it says, Geiges approached Meyer to manufacture part of a nuclear enrichment plant, ordered by “a client” of Krisch Engineering. It was built and exported. “Meyer subsequently established that the client was Pakistan.”
Pakistan was then racing to catch up with India in the nuclear bomb stakes. Both countries’ programmes were illicit by international standards. Khan led the Pakistani programme, for which, according to Der Spiegel, he had recruited Lerch’s help.
Krisch Engineering allegedly had no qualms about profiting from Pakistan’s arch-foe, India, too. The charge sheet claims: “In the late 1980s and early 1990s, [Wisser] commissioned one of his employees to produce flow meter units which were specifically designed for a UF6 [the processed uranium ready for enrichment] application. These systems were delivered to India.”
But the most ambitious project in South Africa allegedly came after Khan, Tahir, Lerch and others agreed to supply Libya’s clandestine programme. In July 1999, says the charge sheet, Wisser travelled to Dubai for technical discussions with Lerch and others. Later that year Geiges, drawn into the project by Wisser, approached Meyer to help. Most manufacturing was to be done at Meyer’s Tradefin.
Meyer opened a Swiss account. Wisser has claimed in a statement that Meyer received R38-million for what he maintained was only a “water purification” plant.
He admitted to receiving a personal commission of a million euros (R7,6-million).
Der Spiegel reports, however, that German investigators believe he received up to 10 times that much. They base this on an interview with Khan’s money man, Tahir, who also told them he had handled $85-million (R534-million) from Libya for its nuclear programme.
In June 2002, says the South African charge sheet, Wisser arranged for two Libyans to inspect the work at Tradefin. Lerch was also consulted directly.
The plant included all the equipment to service a cascade of 5 832 centrifuges, the machines central to nuclear enrichment. There were units to feed the UF6 into the centrifuges and extract the enriched product and waste; the piping systems to connect the centrifuges; and the control, regulating and monitoring systems.
The specialised centrifuge cylinders would also have been manufactured at Tradefin. Controlled manufacturing machinery was illicitly shipped to South Africa for this, but was shipped back to Dubai after that part of the project was abandoned. Wisser allegedly arranged for Tahir to be informed that the machine was on its way back in the following words: “The gift has been dispatched with DHL.” The machine was eventually recovered in Libya by US investigators.
Plans were made to export the plant via Mozambique. A fake contract for “high purification water treatment plants”, supposedly destined for Jordan, was drawn up, signed by “Professor Tahir”.
But then the BBC China was stopped in Italy and the Libyan nuclear programme abandoned. Wisser destroyed evidence at Krisch Engineering and travelled to Dubai for further instructions. From there, he sent the “bird must be destroyed” SMS to Meyer. Meyer did not comply.