Pakistan tests longest-range nuclear-ready missile

PAKISTAN yesterday tested its longest-range missile yet, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead and hitting targets deep inside neighbouring India, the military said.

"Pakistan today successfully carried out the maiden test fire of the Shaheen 2 surface-to-surface ballistic missile," a military statement said. No details were given on where the test was conducted.

Tests in the past have been conducted in remote Baluchistan or into the Arabian Sea, or from a missile facility at Jhelum, 60 miles south-east of the capital, Islamabad.

The missile "can carry all types of warheads up to 1,250 miles", the statement said.

A Defence Ministry official said that meant both "conventional and unconventional warheads".

Pakistan's previous longest-range missile was the Ghouri tested in 1997, which has a range of 810 miles.

Neighbouring countries including arch-rival India had been informed in advance "as a confidence-building measure," the statement said.

Both countries routinely conduct such missile tests, but also have used them in the past to send political messages or ratchet up tension.

Such a message was not likely to be hidden in today's test, which came amid peace moves in recent months between the nuclear-armed South Asian rivals.

Pakistan's government has said for weeks that it was planning the test, though it had not announced an exact date.

India and Pakistan last month set themselves a roadmap to peace that will include negotiations to solve their dispute over divided Kashmir the issue at the heart of their five decades of hostility.

Domestically, the test appeared aimed at allaying concerns that President General Pervez Musharraf was rolling back the country's nuclear programme under international pressure, after Pakistan's top nuclear scientist admitted spreading sensitive technology to other countries.

Abdul Qadeer Khan, considered the father of Pakistan's nuclear programme, confessed in February to proliferating weapons technology to Libya, Iran and North Korea. Gen Musharraf pardoned Khan but political opponents have blamed the president for initiating an inquiry into Khan in the first place.

The statement released after yesterday's test noted that Gen Musharraf had announced the planned test launch of the Shaheen 2 at a press conference on February 5.

That was the occasion when he announced Khan's pardon, while at the same time "categorically dismissing apprehensions of a rollback" in Pakistan's nuclear deterrent.

"The test demonstrates Pakistan's advanced scientific capability in the strategic field," the statement said.

"It is a tribute to the brilliance, hard work and patriotism of its dedicated community of scientists, engineers and technicians," the statement continued.

The statement stressed that the Shaheen 2 is indigenously developed by Pakistani scientists."

Pakistan has been accused of trading its nuclear know-how to North Korea in exchange for the missile technology it lacked, a charge which Islamabad denies.