Posted on 07/04/2004 8:58:26 PM PDT by neverdem
Illicit sales of uranium from Niger were being negotiated with five states including Iraq at least three years before the US-led invasion, senior European intelligence officials have told the Financial Times.
Intelligence officers learned between 1999 and 2001 that uranium smugglers planned to sell illicitly mined Nigerien uranium ore, or refined ore called yellow cake, to Iran, Libya, China, North Korea and Iraq.
These claims support the assertion made in the British government dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programme in September 2002 that Iraq had sought to buy uranium from an African country, confirmed later as Niger. George W. Bush, US president, referred to the issue in his State of the Union address in January 2003.
The claim that the illicit export of uranium was under discussion was widely dismissed when letters referring to the sales - apparently sent by a Nigerien official to a senior official in Saddam Hussein's regime - were proved by the International Atomic Energy Agency to be forgeries. This embarrassed the US and led the administration to reverse its earlier claim.
But European intelligence officials have for the first time confirmed that information provided by human intelligence sources during an operation mounted in Europe and Africa produced sufficient evidence for them to believe that Niger was the centre of a clandestine international trade in uranium.
Officials said the fake documents, which emerged in October 2002 and have been traced to an Italian with a record for extortion and deception, added little to the picture gathered from human intelligence and were only given weight by the Bush administration.
According to a senior counter-proliferation official, meetings between Niger officials and would-be buyers from the five countries were held in several European countries, including Italy. Intelligence officers were convinced that the uranium would be smuggled from abandoned mines in Niger, thereby circumventing official export controls. "The sources were trustworthy. There were several sources, and they were reliable sources," an official involved in the European intelligence gathering operation said.
The UK government used the details in its Iraq weapons dossier, which it used to justify war with Iraq after concluding that it corresponded with other information it possessed, including evidence gathered by GCHQ, the UK eavesdropping centre, of a visit to Niger by an Iraqi official.
However, the European investigation suggested that it was the smugglers who were actively looking for markets, though it was unclear how far the deals had progressed and whether deliveries of uranium were made.
http://www.nytimes.com/financialtimes/business/FT1087373295002.html
PING
Sweet mint tea, anyone?
Well now......
I guess the classifieds were full.
Thanks for retrieving that from the business section!
Ping.
Yeah Page 12 Z Arts and Entertainment section, LOL.
Oh, tie some yellowcake around the old oak tree, it's been two long years ...!
;ing
Am I misunderstanding something here? Isn't this a really big story? I mean, like screaming headline big?
Now that's a damn shame. How many of the lefts assertions against President Bush have been proven to be BS? Who keeps score?
Yes, you're misunderstanding everything. This is a non-story, just like the WMDs found in Iraq over the past six weeks are non-stories. Now move along, before I run you in!
the real concern is why haven't we gone after niger if they are actively trying to sell uranium on the black market??
Okay, I understand now. Just wake me when the election is over. Nothing to see here.
Do we have a universal name and password for the NYT? I don't want to register, but I sure would like to download a copy of this for a commie colleague.
Try BugMeNot.com. It works for WaPO. I'm registered at both. I don't feel burdened by either of them. You need to know what the enemy thinks.
At the next White House news conference, this story should be blown up poster sized and displayed for all to see.
After 9/11 the Dems were crying about Bush not being able to
connect the dots, now it appears they don't know what a dot
looks like.
Which story, about the uranium or how the Times buried it?
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