Syria Today | Radioactive Allegations

Radioactive Allegations

Words Fay Ferguson
Illustration Ali Abdo

For over seven months, the reasons behind a September 6, 2007 Israeli air raid on a site in eastern Syria along the Euphrates River were shrouded in mystery. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert imposed a news blackout on the incident and US President George Bush refused to disclose any information publicly.

Amidst a series of subsequent developments that have further isolated Syria on the international stage – including the ongoing presidential crisis in Lebanon and a divisive Arab Summit – the Bush administration broke its silence on April 24. Coinciding with the end of a two-day meeting between US and North Korean officials on Pyongyang’s nuclear programme and amidst reports of a revival of Syrian-Israeli peace negotiations, the White House released intelligence to the US Congress and the media that alleges the Syrian site bombed last September was a nuclear reactor constructed with North Korean assistance.

US intelligence alleged that the nuclear reactor was located in the desert near al-Kibar in Syria’s Deir ez-Zor province and was nearing operational capability in August 2007. A US intelligence video presentation released to the media, including still photographs taken inside the alleged reactor and a video showing the site before and after the bombing are claimed to prove that it closely resembled the North Korean model at Yongbyon. The US also alleges that Syria moved quickly to clean up the site after the raid to bury the evidence of its existence. “This cover-up only served to reinforce our confidence that this reactor was not intended for peaceful activities,” a White House press statement said on April 24.

Innocence is best proof

Syria vehemently denies allegations that it was building a nuclear facility and that it has any ‘nuclear’ ties with North Korea. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said in an April 27 interview with the Qatari daily al-Watan that the air strike hit a military site under construction. “Does it make sense that we would build a nuclear facility in the desert and not protect it with anti-aircraft defences?” he asked. “A nuclear site exposed to (spy) satellites, in the heart of Syria and in an open space?”

Syrian Ambassador to Britain Sami al-Khiyami emphasised that there is good reason to be sceptical about US intelligence. In the run-up to the US invasion of Iraq, US Secretary of State Colin Powell presented tape recordings and images to the United Nations Security Council as evidence of Saddam Hussein’s pursuit of weapons of mass destruction – a claim which was subsequently proven false. “The scenario of taking and retaking pictures looks like what happened before the Iraq war, when the US was trying to convince the world that Iraq had nuclear weapons,” Khiyami told the UK’s Guardian newspaper. Meanwhile Syrian Ambassador to the US Imad Moustapha said at an April 25 news conference in Washington that the CIA had “fabricated” the pictures and he predicted that in the coming weeks the US story about the site would “implode from within”.

Some doubt that Syria could actually implement such a project. “Syria does not have the financial capacity to start such a venture and she also knows she is closely scrutinised and observed,” Syrian political analyst Thabet Salem said.

This has led many critics to ask: how was Damascus going to get fissile material to power the reactor? Where was the reprocessing plant needed to convert spent fuel into weapons-grade plutonium? At the very least, gaps in US intelligence make it unlikely that the alleged nuclear reactor was “close to being operational” as the CIA claimed to Congress.

Samir Altaqi, the general coordinator at Damascus’ Orient Centre for Studies, believes that Syria will react to the US allegations by cooperating fully with the international community. “They will make a full disclosure because they have the best defence: innocence. Syria will be able to demonstrate that it has adhered to all of its international obligations,” he said.

Prospects for peace

Knowing their intelligence would face severe credibility problems, the question arises as to why the US has only now presented its evidence to the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). “If there had been any real evidence about a Syrian nuclear facility, the US and Israel would have gone straight to the UN because that would have been the most difficult thing for Syria to deal with. The fact that they bombed first and therefore destroyed any of their supposed evidence is proof they had no proof,” Altaqi said.

With the bombsite cleared and a new building erected in place of the alleged reactor, it is unclear how IAEA investigations will be able to verify US intelligence. Mohamed el-Baradei, the director general of IAEA, said the agency was taking the allegations seriously, but also condemned the Israeli attack and chided the US for not disclosing information to the agency sooner. “The unilateral use of force by Israel undermines the due process of verification that is at the heart of the non-proliferation regime,” he said in a press statement released on April 25.

At a news conference in the White House Rose Garden on April 29, President Bush said the intelligence had been withheld until now because of the risk of Syrian “retaliation”, but that such concerns had now “receded”.

Indeed, despite high tensions in the past few months which suggested the possibility of renewed conflict between Israel and Syria, the political climate has now developed into talk of a peace settlement being reached over the Golan Heights. President Assad revealed that Turkey is mediating to revive Syrian-Israeli negotiations, which Olmert confirmed on April 27. Yet whilst the possibility of a Syrian-Israeli peace deal suggests that the risk of further conflict has receded, the effects of the US nuclear allegations could reinforce Syria’s isolation.

Some analysts attribute the public disclosure of the US allegations of Syrian nuclear activity to competing currents within the Bush Administration. Altaqi claims that the neo-conservative hardliners in the Bush Administration are against a Syrian-Israeli peace agreement. “They want to sink any possible peace accord and I think one is really possible. The Syrians are serious about it and it is the first time since Rabin that an Israeli leader has acknowledged the return of the Golan is the price Israel must pay for peace,” he said.

The recent developments highlight US and Israeli strategic lines of policy towards Syria as complex and contradictory. Some speculate that the Israeli raid might serve as a warning to Tehran to cease its uranium enrichment programme. However some analysts doubt that the US has the capacity to transform its rhetoric into action. “The Israeli attack and US allegations keep up the pressure on Syria and perhaps even serve as a pretext for further attacks. However, I don’t think the US is in a condition to launch any new adventures, in Syria or Iran. They are spread too thin and even the US military is against it,” Altaqi said.