White House 'exaggerated extent of WMD breakthrough'

[hedgetrimmer]

~SNIP~
By Rupert Cornwell in Washington
26 March 2004


The White House has been accused of exaggerating the nuclear threat posed by Libya, whose agreement to give up its weapons of mass destruction has been presented by the Bush administration and the British government as a positive consequence of the invasion of Iraq.

The controversy has erupted in the wake of an unusual press briefing last week at the United States government's nuclear research laboratory at Oak Ridge, Tennessee.

Amid much fanfare, reporters were shown evidence of what officials said were 4,000 uranium centrifuges, handed over by Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's government as part of its deal with Britain and the United States to give up its nuclear arms programme.

But David Albright, the head of the Washington-based arms control group the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), has said "that was not true". ISIS has established that the 4,000 figure refers merely to casings of the centrifuges which are needed to enrich uranium to weapons-grade level - not to centrifuges fitted with the precision-tooled rotors that are their most important component.

... more ...

link: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=505102

[daleo]

1. This was pretty obvious

A bunch of unopened crates was all I saw in the news reports. They could have been filled with sand from Libya for all anyone knew. But, hey, these guys never lie, do they.

[nodehopper]

2. they really are pathological liars.

I don't mean that as a hyperbole.

[htuttle]

3. They can't help it

It's their nature.

[maggrwaggr]

6. what haven't they lied about?

they can't even tell the truth about Bush's poem to his wife, or the BA plane that never actually saw them on the flight to Baghdad.

They lie every fucking day, twenty four hours a day.

Seriously, WHAT HAVE they told the truth about?

Anything?

[enough]

4. Another big fat juicy lie.

Will this be reported here?

[Gloria]

5. Tony Blair is taking heat for meeting Mumar today....see the latest

World Media Watch....

And see the deals going through,not only Shell oil, but aviation business, too. And that's just the British deals.....Meanwhile, Libya is implicated in 10 YEARS of trying to overthrow governments all around Africa...about 6 or 7 of them....and the International Court is supposed to take this up in June, I think.

And these are our new buddies.........




1//The Independent 26 March 2004

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/africa/story.jsp?story=505109



THE GOLDEN HANDSHAKE: BRAVE STEP OR A CYNICAL PLOY?

By Ben Russell in Tripoli



Tony Blair offered Muammar Gaddafi the "hand of friendship" in a desert tent outside Tripoli yesterday as he held historic talks with the Libyan leader aimed at ending the 20-year isolation of the pariah state and recruiting it as a partner in the war on terror.



The Prime Minister praised Colonel Gaddafi as an example of international rehabilitation and praised his adoption of "a common cause" with the West in the fight against al-Qa'ida, extremism and terrorism.



In an attempt to stress the value of the rapprochement, British diplomats said the two countries were already sharing intelligence on North African groups linked to Osama Bin Laden. British businesses have also begun a rush to exploit Libyan oil and gas reserves potentially worth billions. The Anglo-Dutch energy giant Shell signed an agreement yesterday to invest $200m (£110m) searching for fuel reserves - and the aircraft and defence contractor BAE is hoping to land multimillion-pound deals to supply civil aviation equipment.

MORE

[madrchsod]

7. this whole farce was reported

less than a week after the "big breakthrough" in big mo`s willingness to "give up" his stuff..there wasn`t enough to start a fire...

[Kool Kitty]

8. Oh, gee, here's a surprise-

another steaming pile of manure fresh from the Bush administration. It never ends.

[Lindacooks]

9. You mean - THEY LIED??????????????

Oh, the humanity!

[yltlatl]

10. These are the early maneuvers...

The oilmen are no fools: they want to flee to the western arms (no pun intended) as quickly as they can--at least the ones who can be confident their own jihadists won't cut their feet from under them. Meanwhile, North Korea will side with China regardless--it has no other friend. And once the US occupies the whole ME and Taiwan votes yes in a referendum on indepence? We will find out if China is bluffing...