IAEA asks for information on any Syrian nuclear plans 
 

By Yossi Melman
October 15, 2007
Haaretz
Original Source: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/913062.html http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/913062.html


The United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency on Monday broke its silence over an Israel Air Force strike last month that reportedly targeted a Syrian nuclear facility, and urged any parties with information on Damascus' nuclear plans to come forward. 

The IAEA has no information about any undeclared nuclear facility in Syria and no information about recent reports, said an announcement by the IAEA. 

We would obviously investigate any relevant information coming our way. The IAEA secretariat expects any country having information about nuclear-related activities in another country to provide that information to the IAEA. 
 
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The statement went on to say that the IAEA hopes any country with information on the undeclared nuclear activities in another state would pass it on to the agency. 

According to the IAEA announcement, the agency is in contact with Syrian officials in order to verify the credibility of recent reports, apparently alluding to U.S. and Israeli claims that the IAF targeted a Syrian nuclear facility in September. 

Shortly after the IAF strike was confirmed, Haaretz contacted the IAEA to inquire as to whether the atomic watchdog agency will investigate the reports of Syrian nuclear activity. The IAEA replied that it had no intention of doing so. 

The IAEA statement on Monday is specifically in response to this past weekend's New York Times report according to which the IAF had bombed a Syrian nuclear reactor which was in the initial stages of construction and was modeled after a North Korean reactor. 

Syria is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which prohibits nations from pursuing nuclear research for military purposes. The few nuclear facilities that it maintains in the country are operated under the supervision of the IAEA. 

Yet, according to the safeguard agreement, a government is not obligated to report to the IAEA on the start of construction of a nuclear reactor. A state is required to report on the reactor once building reaches the final stages, or a reasonable amount of time prior to the reactor's activation. 

In the event that Syria's reactor was built for civilian purposes and for research only, then Damascus would not be in violation of its commitments to the IAEA and to the NNPT, even if it did not report on the start of its construction. 

Syria has belonged to the 144-nation IAEA since 1963 and has one declared, small research reactor under agency safeguards. It has denied hiding any nuclear activity from the IAEA or having an atomic bomb programme. 

Since 2003, the IAEA has been investigating past nuclear secrecy in Iran, a member state and ally of Syria. 

Iran has pledged to clarify the scope of its programme by the end of 2007 
in an effort to avoid being hit with harsh UN sanctions over its refusal to stop enriching uranium, a process Western powers suspect Iran is channelling into bombmaking. Iran says it only wants an alternative source of electricity. 

The New York Times said the targeted Syrian facility appeared to have been much further from completion than an Iraqi reactor the Israeli air force destroyed in 1981 in an attack echoed by the incident last month. 

It said U.S. officials were divided over the Syria attack, with some seeing it as premature since the site looked years away from being used to produce spent nuclear fuel that could eventually be used for bomb-grade plutonium. 

It remained unclear how far Syria had progressed with the alleged plant before the attack, what role North Korea might have played and whether a case could be made that it was intended to produce electricity. 

U.S. and foreign officials refused to be drawn on whether they suspected North Korea of having sold or given the plans to Syria, but some said it was possible a transfer of technology occurred several years ago