A mission to the Syrian desert by UN nuclear sleuths to examine a building flattened by Israeli aircraft could open a new front in the search for rogue states trying to develop atomic arms under the radar of the international community.
It is a low-key endeavor: Only four International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors will participate in the three-day project starting yesterday, and both Damascus and the UN agency have pulled down the blinds on news media seeking to report on the trip, keeping all details secret.
Yet the stakes are huge for both Damascus, which denies working on a secret nuclear program, and the IAEA — and through it, the US and its other 34 board member countries.
Washington hopes that the UN agency team will come back with persuasive evidence backing US intelligence that the structure hit by Israel in September was a nearly completed plutonium-producing reactor.
If so, the trip could mark the start of massive atomic agency investigation similar to the probe Iran has been subjected to over the past five years. What’s more, the probe could draw in countries like North Korea, which Washington says helped Damascus and Iran, which media reports have also linked to Syria’s nuclear strivings.
Such prospects alarm Syria. It agreed to allow the nuclear inspectors to visit the bombed Al Kibar site early this month only after months of delay. And it has already said that three other locations suspected of possibly harboring other secret nuclear activities are off limits.
Syrian President Bashar Assad re-emphasized that point earlier this month, saying visits to sites other than Al Kibar were “not within the purview of the agreement” with the IAEA.
Such comments reflect the team’s dilemma: The agency has little formal inspection rights in Syria, which has only a rudimentary declared nuclear program revolving around research and the production of isotopes for medical and agricultural uses, using a small, 27-kilowatt reactor.
Before the trip, IAEA chief Mohamed elBaradei urged Syria to show “transparency,” a call echoed by the US.
“Syria was caught withholding information from the IAEA,” said Gregory Schulte, the chief US delegate to the IAEA. “Now Syria must disclose the truth about Al Kibar and allow IAEA’s inspectors to verify that there are no other undisclosed activities.”
Such calls may fall on deaf ears, however — with the absence of binding agreements with Syria giving the agency broad authority to follow up on nuclear suspicions, the inspectors will have access only to information that the Syrians agree to.
While Damascus has agreed to let the inspectors visit the Al Kibar site, it is unclear what they will be able to do once they get there.
Diplomats accredited to the IAEA said that up to a few days ahead of the trip it was still not clear whether the team would be able to bring ground-penetrating radar needed to probe below the concrete fundament of the new building the Syrians erected on the site of the bombed facility.
How much freedom of movement they would be granted once at the site also was unclear, said the diplomats who were briefed ahead of the mission.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese