New Delhi, March 07:
Two top nuclear scientists of Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) are currently in Taliban custody. The two were working at PAEC’s facility in North West Frontier Province. Zee News investigations reveal that the two scientists were kidnapped about six months ago. To avoid international embarrassment Pakistan Government has kept this information under wraps.
According to information available with Zee News, nuclear scientists have been kidnapped by Taliban at the behest of Al-Qaeda. Further investigations reveal that Al-Qaeda may be using the expertise of the scientists to produce nuclear bombs. The two scientists are reportedly being held somewhere in Waziristan, near Afghanistan border.
In January this year Pakistan security agencies had foiled another attempt by Taliban militia to kidnap nuclear scientists. Earlier, incidents of Taliban militia stealing uranium in NWFP have already been reported. PAEC also has a uranium mining facility in NWFP. With repeated Al Qaeda threats to the US, news of kidnapping of nuclear scientists will increase pressure on Pakistan to attack terrorist camps.
http://zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=358644&archisec=WOR&archisubsec=
Secret Network Helped Defector
March 9, 2007
WASHINGTON - A well-organized Iranian dissident group helped arrange the defection of Iran's former deputy defense minister in Turkey last month, and experts say more defectors are on the way as opposition to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad increases within Iran.
The dissident group, which was not named for security reasons, helped in the planning of Gen. Ali Reza Asghari's Feb. 7 disappearance at a hotel in Istanbul days after his wife and other family members left Iran for a purported vacation, sources said.
The group is currently negotiating with Western intelligence agencies from a hideout somewhere in Europe for a permanent place of exile, sources said. The United States and Israel, fingered by Iran's police chief as Asghari's kidnappers, have issued carefully worded denials that their governments were involved.
Tehran regards Asghari's defection as a disaster. "This is just the tip of the iceberg," said Walid Phares, an expert in Iranian-backed Shiite terrorism. "Opposition to Ahmadinejad is growing inside Iran."