Jerusalem: Israel’s spy agency mosadi German and Swiss companies suspected of bombing and threatening to “work energetically” to aid Pakistan A leading daily said here on Tuesday that in its nascent nuclear weapons program in the 1980s when the Jewish state saw Islamabad acquiring nuclear capability as an “existence threat”.
The Jerusalem Post cited a major Swiss daily report that “suspected that the Mossad carried out the attacks and issued threats soon after” following an unsuccessful intervention by the United States to halt activities after three bombings in 1981. Bombs exploded on three of these companies.
“For Israel, the possibility that Pakistan, for the first time ever with an atomic bomb, could become an Islamic state, is an existential threat,” the Swiss daily Niue Zurcher Zeitung (NZZ) reported on Sunday.
On 28 May 1998, Pakistan conducted five simultaneous underground nuclear tests at Ras Koh Hills in Chagai district of Balochistan province. Codenamed Chhagai-I, this was Pakistan’s first public test of nuclear weapons. The second nuclear test, Chagai-II, took place on 30 May of the same year.
As NZZ reports, Pakistan and the Islamic Republic of Iran worked closely together on developing nuclear weapons equipment in the 1980s, with German and Swiss companies working “relatively well” to aid their nuclear program. researched”.
“New, previously unknown, documents from the archives in Bern and Washington sharpen this picture,” it claimed.
Swiss historian Adrian Haney is quoted as saying that the Mossad was involved in bomb attacks on Swiss and German companies, although there was no “smoking gun” to prove that the Israeli spy agency carried out the attacks after discovering these attempts. Gave.
The Organization for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in South Asia claimed responsibility for the explosions in Switzerland and Germany.
The NZZ report also mentions the role of the disgraced late Pakistani nuclear scientist, Abdul Qadir Khan, who traveled around Europe during the 1980s to obtain technology and blueprints to develop the atomic bomb from Western institutions and companies.
Khan is said to have met a delegation of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization at the Zurich Hotel in 1987. The Iranian delegation is said to have been led by the chief engineer of Iran’s Atomic Energy Commission, Masoud Narghi.
Narghi was accompanied by two German engineers, Gotthard Lerch and Heinz Maybus – who earned their Ph.D. In America – Said to have met Khan’s group in Switzerland. Additional meetings reportedly took place in Dubai.
The report said that in the wake of Pakistan’s “rapidly increasing efforts” to launch its nuclear weapons programme, the US tried to persuade the German and Swiss governments to act on aid companies, but was unsuccessful.
Suspected agents of Mossad are said to have taken “action” against companies and engineers aiding Pakistan.
“A few months after the failed US State Department intervention in Bonn and Bern, unidentified criminals carried out explosive attacks on three of these companies – on February 20, 1981, at the home of a key employee of Kora Engineering Chur; on May 18, 1981 at the factory building of the Wallischmiller company in Markdorf and on November 6, 1981 in the engineering office of Heinz Maybus in Erlangen,” NZZ reported.
“All three attacks resulted in property damage only, and only Maybus’ dog was killed,” it said.
The explosions are said to have been followed by several phone calls in English and broken German, with strangers threatening other companies.
“The attack we launched against Wallishmiller Company could happen to you too – this is how the Lebold-Herius administration office was threatened.
“The owner of VAT at the time, Siegfried Schertler and his chief salesman Tinner were called several times on their private lines. skirtler He also told the Swiss Federal Police that the Israeli Secret Service had contacted him. This investigation stems from files NZZ was able to see for the first time,” the report said.
Skirtler was quoted as saying that he was contacted by David, an employee of the Israeli embassy in Germany.
David is said to have urged him to stop “these businesses” regarding nuclear weapons and go into the textile business.
Swiss and German companies made huge profits from their association with the Khan nuclear weapons network.
“Many of these suppliers, mainly from Germany and Switzerland, soon entered into trade with Pakistan worth millions: Lebold-Herrius, Wallischmiller, Kora Engg Chur, Vakum-Appert-Technik (VAT, main buyer Friedrich Tinner with) or Butchs Metal Works, to name a few.
“They benefited from an important circumstance: the German and Swiss authorities interpreted their dual-use provisions very liberally: most of the components needed for uranium enrichment, for example, high-precision vacuum valves, were mainly used for civilian purposes. are used for,” NZZ reported.
The National Security Archive in Washington has also recently published diplomatic correspondence from the US State Department to Bonn and Byrne in 1980 revealing new information.
The US appears to have opposed the “contingent handling of fragile deliveries to Pakistan” by these two countries.
Byrne’s behavior was described by an employee as a “hands-off approach” and local officials were accused of “turning an eye” in these communications.
“The dispatches released now, which were previously classified as secret, list for the first time companies that the US has accused of supporting the Pakistani nuclear weapons program with their deliveries.
The Swiss daily is said to have included about half a dozen companies from Germany and Switzerland on the list.
The Jerusalem Post cited a major Swiss daily report that “suspected that the Mossad carried out the attacks and issued threats soon after” following an unsuccessful intervention by the United States to halt activities after three bombings in 1981. Bombs exploded on three of these companies.
“For Israel, the possibility that Pakistan, for the first time ever with an atomic bomb, could become an Islamic state, is an existential threat,” the Swiss daily Niue Zurcher Zeitung (NZZ) reported on Sunday.
On 28 May 1998, Pakistan conducted five simultaneous underground nuclear tests at Ras Koh Hills in Chagai district of Balochistan province. Codenamed Chhagai-I, this was Pakistan’s first public test of nuclear weapons. The second nuclear test, Chagai-II, took place on 30 May of the same year.
As NZZ reports, Pakistan and the Islamic Republic of Iran worked closely together on developing nuclear weapons equipment in the 1980s, with German and Swiss companies working “relatively well” to aid their nuclear program. researched”.
“New, previously unknown, documents from the archives in Bern and Washington sharpen this picture,” it claimed.
Swiss historian Adrian Haney is quoted as saying that the Mossad was involved in bomb attacks on Swiss and German companies, although there was no “smoking gun” to prove that the Israeli spy agency carried out the attacks after discovering these attempts. Gave.
The Organization for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in South Asia claimed responsibility for the explosions in Switzerland and Germany.
The NZZ report also mentions the role of the disgraced late Pakistani nuclear scientist, Abdul Qadir Khan, who traveled around Europe during the 1980s to obtain technology and blueprints to develop the atomic bomb from Western institutions and companies.
Khan is said to have met a delegation of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization at the Zurich Hotel in 1987. The Iranian delegation is said to have been led by the chief engineer of Iran’s Atomic Energy Commission, Masoud Narghi.
Narghi was accompanied by two German engineers, Gotthard Lerch and Heinz Maybus – who earned their Ph.D. In America – Said to have met Khan’s group in Switzerland. Additional meetings reportedly took place in Dubai.
The report said that in the wake of Pakistan’s “rapidly increasing efforts” to launch its nuclear weapons programme, the US tried to persuade the German and Swiss governments to act on aid companies, but was unsuccessful.
Suspected agents of Mossad are said to have taken “action” against companies and engineers aiding Pakistan.
“A few months after the failed US State Department intervention in Bonn and Bern, unidentified criminals carried out explosive attacks on three of these companies – on February 20, 1981, at the home of a key employee of Kora Engineering Chur; on May 18, 1981 at the factory building of the Wallischmiller company in Markdorf and on November 6, 1981 in the engineering office of Heinz Maybus in Erlangen,” NZZ reported.
“All three attacks resulted in property damage only, and only Maybus’ dog was killed,” it said.
The explosions are said to have been followed by several phone calls in English and broken German, with strangers threatening other companies.
“The attack we launched against Wallishmiller Company could happen to you too – this is how the Lebold-Herius administration office was threatened.
“The owner of VAT at the time, Siegfried Schertler and his chief salesman Tinner were called several times on their private lines. skirtler He also told the Swiss Federal Police that the Israeli Secret Service had contacted him. This investigation stems from files NZZ was able to see for the first time,” the report said.
Skirtler was quoted as saying that he was contacted by David, an employee of the Israeli embassy in Germany.
David is said to have urged him to stop “these businesses” regarding nuclear weapons and go into the textile business.
Swiss and German companies made huge profits from their association with the Khan nuclear weapons network.
“Many of these suppliers, mainly from Germany and Switzerland, soon entered into trade with Pakistan worth millions: Lebold-Herrius, Wallischmiller, Kora Engg Chur, Vakum-Appert-Technik (VAT, main buyer Friedrich Tinner with) or Butchs Metal Works, to name a few.
“They benefited from an important circumstance: the German and Swiss authorities interpreted their dual-use provisions very liberally: most of the components needed for uranium enrichment, for example, high-precision vacuum valves, were mainly used for civilian purposes. are used for,” NZZ reported.
The National Security Archive in Washington has also recently published diplomatic correspondence from the US State Department to Bonn and Byrne in 1980 revealing new information.
The US appears to have opposed the “contingent handling of fragile deliveries to Pakistan” by these two countries.
Byrne’s behavior was described by an employee as a “hands-off approach” and local officials were accused of “turning an eye” in these communications.
“The dispatches released now, which were previously classified as secret, list for the first time companies that the US has accused of supporting the Pakistani nuclear weapons program with their deliveries.
The Swiss daily is said to have included about half a dozen companies from Germany and Switzerland on the list.
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