DAMASCUS/TOKYO (AFP)
Syria said on Monday that U.S. accusations it was building a nuclear reactor until an Israeli air raid destroyed it last September were as bogus as American claims that Saddam Hussein's regime had weapons of mass destruction in 2003.
The ruling Baath party's mouthpiece daily compared the photographs of the bombed site shown to U.S. congressmen last week to the images Washington presented to the U.N. Security Council as alleged evidence of Iraq's non-conventional arsenal in the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion.
"When you look at these pictures... a single image comes to mind -- that of U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell accusing Iraq of hiding weapons of mass destruction and presenting as proof a dossier of photographs," Al-Baath said.
"Of course Mr Powell later acknowledged that he had been fooled by the U.S. intelligence services and by conservatives within the administration," the paper said.
"The new U.S. campaign of lies should surprise nobody -- it's a continuation of the same policy of U.S. pressure against Syria that's been going on" for the past five years, the paper added.
"Syria again rejects the U.S. allegations and reaffirms that it has nothing to hide concerning its legitimate national defenses. Syria wants to see peace in the region, unlike the current U.S. administration which has been behind all its wars and crises."
U.S. national security officials briefed U.S. congressmen on Thursday, presenting intelligence they said showed Syria had been building a secret nuclear reactor for military ends.
They said the plant was being built with the help of North Korea, until its destruction by Israel in an air raid on September 6.
The International Atomic Energy Agency launched an investigation into the U.S. accusations on Friday but also chided both Israel and the United States for their handling of the affair.
Syria roundly rejected the U.S. allegations but promised full cooperation with the U.N. watchdog.
In an interview published by the Qatari daily Al-Watan on Sunday, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad ridiculed the U.S. accusations.
"Does it make sense that we would build a nuclear facility in the desert and not protect it with anti-aircraft defenses?" he asked. "A nuclear site exposed to (spy) satellites, in the heart of Syria and in an open space?
"We don't want a nuclear bomb... Where would we use it?... War in the region will effectively remain conventional," Assad said. |
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Japanese TV reports Meanwhile, Japan's public broadcaster NHK reported Monday that ten North Koreans were suspected to have been killed in the Israeli air strike on the alleged nuclear reactor.
Quoting unidentified South Korean intelligence sources, NHK said they were part of a North Korean team accused of helping Syria secretly build a nuclear reactor.
They included agents of the military production bureau of the communist state's ruling Workers Party as well as soldiers who had taken part in the construction of nuclear facilities back in North Korea, the network added.
The military production bureau is said to be in charge of selling weapons and military technology for hard currency under the direct instruction of North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-Il, it said.
NHK said the North Koreans' bodies were cremated and the ashes sent home. Cremation is standard practice in North Korea.
A few North Koreans survived the attack but their whereabouts remain unknown, the report said, adding that South Korean authorities were continuing to collect information on the case. |
