Saddam Hussein's intelligence agencies managed a network of secret cells that executed chemical and biological research but produced no weapons, The Sunday Times reported, quoting a senior Iraqi security official.
The British weekly reported a general who procured supplies for the program via a foreign network of front companies had told it that laboratories were hidden in basements in houses around the capital city.
"But it was all just theory.... the aim was to keep us up to date and ready so that if (United Nations) sanctions were lifted or we needed to produce chemical or biological weapons again, we could start up immediately," the unnamed general said.
The general insisted that search teams would find no weapons. "I challenge anyone in Iraq, from north to south, to find anything," he told The Sunday Times. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
