Give that man a Nobel Prize.
Excerpts:
In 2002, the United States, Britain and Israel strongly suspected the new Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradai, of employing secret delaying tactics to help three Muslim nations get their nuclear weapons programs off the ground. The nations were Libya, Iran and Egypt.
Intelligence data showed those programs as being nourished by the technology, experience and expertise of Pakistan and North Korea, both motivated by their dire cash shortage. The assumption therefore in Washington, Jerusalem and London – later proved correct – was that the necessary funding was put up by Tehran, Tripoli and Cairo.
By means of delicate diplomacy during 2003 and 2004, the Bush administration persuaded Libya to relinquish its nuclear weapons industry. US military planes flew the centrifuges Pakistan supplied Libya for uranium enrichment and its yellow cake out of the country to the United States. Pakistan, prodded by Washington, “uncovered” a nuclear black market ring headed by Dr Qader Khan, the father of the Pakistan nuclear bomb, and Egypt confessed to possessing a supply of enriched uranium for military purposes.
While this was going on, Dr. ElBaradei and the IAEA teams stood on the sidelines in a supportive role.
These episodes demonstrate that the prime mover in dismantling the most dangerous focii of nuclear weapons production was the Bush administration rather than the UN nuclear watchdog and its director. It was only after these episodes were successfully concluded that ElBaradei realized that Washington had drawn up new rules for the international nuclear game. He began cooperating in earnest with America’s effort to disarm North Korea.