Is Myanmar Going Nuke?

Asia Times Online reports that Southeast Asian leaders are getting nervous about a spate of recent top-level visits to North Korea by top Myanmar generals. The worst case scenario that has them in a tizzy is the prospect of the Burmese junta acquiring nuclear arms or nuclear weapon technology from the Koreans.

“The rapid-fire visits have gone beyond goodwill gestures and the normal diplomatic niceties of re-establishing ties. Rather, the personalities involved in the visits indicate that Myanmar is not only seeking weapons procurements, but also probable cooperation in establishing air defense weaponry, missiles, rockets or artillery production facilities.

Myanmar’s stagnant nuclear program was revitalized shortly after Pakistan’s first detonation of nuclear weapons in May 1998. Senior general and junta leader Than Shwe signed the Atomic Energy Law on June 8, 1998, and the timing of the legislation so soon after Pakistan’s entry into the nuclear club did little to assuage international concerns about Myanmar’s nuclear intentions. Some analysts believe the regime may eventually seek nuclear weapons for the dual purpose of international prestige and strategic deterrence.

…The famine in North Korea in the late 1990s and Myanmar’s military expansion ambitions, including a drive for self-sufficiency in production, have fostered recent trade flows. While Myanmar has the agricultural surplus to ease North Korean hunger, Pyongyang possesses the weapons and technological know-how needed to boost Yangon’s military might. There is also speculation Myanmar might provide uranium, mined in remote and difficult-to-monitor areas, to North Korea.”

 

Pervez’ Purported Perfidy

The father of the “Islamic Bomb” alleges that the Pakistani military, then under the command of Pervez Musharraf, supervised a flight of nuclear centrifuges to North Korea in 2000. From BBC News:

“Disgraced scientist AQ Khan has said that Pakistan transported nuclear material to North Korea with the full knowledge of the country’s army.

At the time President Pervez Musharraf was head of the army.

Dr Khan said that uranium enrichment equipment was sent in a North Korean plane loaded under the supervision of Pakistani security officials.

The BBC’s Barbara Plett, in Islamabad, says that Dr Khan’s latest claims contradict a public confession he made in 2004 that he was solely responsible for exporting nuclear technology to Iran, North Korea and Libya.

Our correspondent says that the comments are the most controversial accusation made by Dr Khan since he recently began defending himself in statements to the media.

His comments are also at variance with the oft-stated line of the Pakistani government that neither it nor the army had any knowledge of the exports.”