UN criticises Israel and US over bombing of Syrian facility

THE head of the UN nuclear monitoring agency angrily criticised Israel yesterday for bombing an alleged Syrian nuclear facility, and chastised the US for withholding information on the site.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei was not provided with information about the site until Thursday, the same day US officials briefed members of the House Intelligence Committee about evidence, including dozens of photographs taken from ground level and footage of the interior of the building gathered by spy satellites after the Israeli strike seven months ago.

ElBaradei was briefed by telephone by John Rood, the US undersecretary of state for arms control.

“The Director General deplores the fact that this information was not provided to the agency in a timely manner, in accordance with the agency’s responsibilities under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), to enable it to verify its veracity and establish the facts,” ElBaradei’s office said.

Additionally, “the Director General views the unilateral use of force by Israel as undermining the due process of verification that is at the heart of the non-proliferation regime,” it said. ElBaradei did not criticise North Korea or Syria in his statement.

The IAEA’s mission includes trying to keep nuclear proliferation in check, and depends on member states for information in carrying out that task. It is probing allegations Iran tried to make nuclear weapons, using not only its own research but intelligence provided by the US and other members of the 35-nation IAEA board.

Intelligence committee members also expressed anger over the seven-month time lapse before they were briefed.

Top US intelligence officials who briefed reporters in Washington on Thursday said they had high confidence in the judgment that North Korea had aided Syria with its nuclear programme and the intention was to produce plutonium. But they claimed only low confidence in the conclusion that it was meant for weapons development, in part because there was no reprocessing facility at the site — something that would be needed to extract plutonium for use in a bomb.

The Syrian reactor was within weeks or months of being functional when Israeli jets destroyed it, a US official said.