By a peculiar combination of circumstances, this reporter and a colleague stumbled upon a tiny piece of this gigantic puzzle. We obtained a videotape made in 2000 in which the all-powerful head of Iraq's secret police, the Mukhabarat, one of his informers and the head of Iraq's Military Intelligence science department are captured discussing a sting operation they mounted to retrieve a missing canister, which disappeared under mysterious circumstances at least seven years ago from Iraq's main chemical-weapons facility, and ended up on the black market. The canister contained a chemical used in the production of nerve gas.The remarkable thing about this conversation -- which we have confirmed was authentic -- is that these top-ranking Iraqi officials say they turned over the canister to the National Monitoring Directorate -- an agency set up to coordinate between the Iraqi government and the U.N. inspectors -- and that they are going to harmlessly dispose of the material by having it turned into detergent. In short, the tape catches them apparently behaving in a responsible fashion -- and this during the four-year period when no United Nations inspectors were even present.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/09/20/chemical/index_np.html