Attacking Iran could speed up N-programme

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.khaleejtimes.ae/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/middleeast/2007/March/middleeast_March64.xml§ion=middleeast

LONDON - Pre-emptive military strikes on Iran could accelerate rather than hinder Teheran’s production of atomic weapons, a report by a British global security think-tank said Monday.

Backed by the former chief UN weapons inspector in Iraq, Hans Blix, the Oxford Research Group said Iran could respond to an attack by launching a “crash programme” and build a crude nuclear device within months.

“If Iran is moving towards a nuclear weapons capacity it is doing it relatively slowly, most estimates put it at least five years away,” said one of the report’s authors, leading British nuclear scientist Frank Barnaby.

“However attacking Iran — far from setting back their progress towards a bomb — would almost certainly lead to a fast-track programme to develop a small number of nuclear devices as quickly as possible.