The British government has reportedly sold nuclear weapon-grade material to Iran, stated BBC. Government officials insist that the sale of metal beryllium to the Islamic Republic, approved by the UK’s Trade and Industry Department late last year, was meant for non-military production.
In September 2001, UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw met with Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, the first British foreign envoy dispatched to the Republic in 25 years. During what was publicized as a meeting intended to secure a coalition for the war on terror, Straw was allegedly bartering for the sale of beryllium to a nation that has publicly stated its plans to build an atomic bomb.
The UK imposed an arms embargo on the sale of weapons to Iran in 1993. However, a similar embargo policy was overridden in July, when the Blair administration authorized the sale of sophisticated navigation and targeting equipment for F16’s to Israel.
Seeking to launch a new era of "ethical foreign policy", Tony Blair's Labor government passed a law in 1997 stipulating that arms cannot be sold to a country "if there is a clearly identifiable risk that the intended recipient would use the proposed export aggressively against another country.”
Beryllium is a hard gray metal that is extracted from the earth‚ refined and reduced to a very fine powder. Pure beryllium metal is used in the manufacture of aircraft disc brakes‚ nuclear weapons and reactors‚ missile parts‚ heat shields‚ x–ray machine parts‚ mirrors and spacecraft. — (menareport.com)
© 2002 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
