The head of Pakistan's Joint Chiefs of Staff yesterday rejected a report that Islamabad might allow U.S. forces to help secure its nuclear arsenal against an imminent threat from terrorists or military insiders, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, Nov. 9).
(Nov. 10) -
A Pakistani soldier fires a heavy machine gun on Taliban positions in South Waziristan last month. A top Pakistani military official yesterday denied a report that the nation could accept U.S. security assistance for its nuclear weapons in an emergency (Nicolas Asfouri/Getty Images).
The report, written by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh for the New Yorker, is "absurd and plain mischievous," Gen. Tariq Majid said.
"We have operationalized a very effective nuclear security regime which incorporates very stringent custodial and access controls," he said. "As overall custodian of the development of our strategic program, I reiterate in very unambiguous terms that there is absolutely no question of sharing or allowing any foreign individual, entity or a state, any access to sensitive information about our nuclear assets."
Pakistan's nuclear cooperation with other nations is strictly aimed at helping Islamabad acquire expertise on securing its own nuclear weapons, Majid added.
International nuclear assistance to Pakistan is predicated on "two clearly spelled-out red lines -- nonintrusiveness and our right to pick and choose," Majid said.
"Also, our security apparatus has the capacity and is fully geared to meet all conceivable challenges, therefore we do not need to negotiate with any other country to physically augment our security forces, which in any case, we believe, are more capable than their forces," he said.
The U.S. Embassy in Islamabad sought Sunday to assuage suspicions that Washington wanted to neutralize Pakistan's nuclear deterrent.
"The United States has no intention to seize Pakistani nuclear weapons or material," said spokesman Larry Schwartz (Agence France-Presse/Google News, Nov. 9).
Hersh defended his report in an interview with CNN. He said there is a significant difference between the existing U.S. program and an older plan by Washington to secure Pakistani nuclear weapons, which he addressed in a 2001 piece.
"They're now saying, 'We're going to help you,'" Hersh said. The latest program emphasizes delinking Pakistan's nuclear warheads from their triggers rather than seizing the weapons themselves, he said (CNN, Nov. 8).