Syria's secret nuclear plans exposed

by **Admin** Sun Apr 27, 2008 4:55 am

In
a move that could result in military action against North Korea and/or
Syria, US intelligence officials are set to tell lawmakers on Thursday
that Pyongyang shared nuclear know-how with Syria.

The
Bush administration is set to tell Congress today that a nuclear
facility in Syria built with North Korean help was nearly complete when
Israel bombed it in September, but that Pyongyang has not provided any
further nuclear assistance to the hard-line Arab nation, at least at
that site, U.S. officials said.

CIA
Director Michael V. Hayden and other intelligence officials are
expected to brief several congressional committees in closed-door
sessions, breaking the administration's silence on the issue. The
facility has become a major issue in six-nation negotiations to end the
North's nuclear programs.

"The belief is that the reactor was nearing completion," said one official familiar with the content of the briefings.

"If
it had been complete, the reactor would have been capable of producing
plutonium for nuclear weapons, but it was destroyed before it could do
so," the official said. "That's the result of solid intelligence."