- Donald Rumsfeld, the US secretary of defense, was on
the board of technology giant ABB when it won a deal to supply North Korea
with two nuclear power plants.
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- Weapons experts say waste material from the two reactors
could be used for so-called 'dirty bombs'.
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- The Swiss-based ABB on Friday told swissinfo that Rumsfeld
was involved with the company in early 2000, when it netted a $200 million
(SFr270million) contract with Pyongyang.
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- The ABB contract was to deliver equipment and services
for two nuclear power stations at Kumho, on North Koreaís east coast.
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- Rumsfeld - who is one of the Bush administration's most
strident 'hardliners' on North Korea - was a member of ABB's board between
1990 and February 2001, when he left to take up his current post.
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- Wolfram Eberhardt, a spokesman for ABB, told swissinfo
that Rumsfeld ìwas at nearly all the board meetings during his decade-long
involvement with the company.
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- Maybe, Maybe Not
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- However, he declined to indicate whether Rumsfeld was
made aware of the nuclear contract with North Korea.
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- "This is a good question, but I couldn't comment
on that because we never disclose the protocols of the board meetings,'
Eberhardt said.
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- "Maybe this was a discussion point of the board,
maybe not."
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- The defense secretary's role at ABB during the late 1990s
has become a bone of contention in Washington.
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- The ABB contract was a consequence of a 1994 deal between
the US and Pyongyang to allow construction of two reactors in exchange
for a freeze on the North's nuclear weapons programme.
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- North Korea revealed last year that it had secretly continued
its nuclear weapons programme, despite its obligations under the deal with
Washington.
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- The Bush government has repeatedly used the agreement
to criticise the former Clinton administration for being too soft on North
Korea. Rumsfeld's deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, has been among the most vocal
critics of the 1994 weapons accord.
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- Dirty Bombs
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- Weapons experts have also speculated that waste material
from the two reactors could be used for so-called 'dirty bombs'.
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- Rumsfeld's position at ABB could prove embarrassing for
the Bush administration since while he was a director he was also active
on issues of weapons proliferation, chairing the 1998 congressional Ballistic
Missile Threat commission.
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- The commission suggested the Clinton-era deal with Pyongyang
gave too much away because "North Korea maintains an active weapons
of mass destruction programme, including a nuclear weapons programme."
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- >From Zurich To Pyongyang
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- At the same time, Rumsfeld was travelling to Zurich for
ABB's quarterly board-meetings.
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- Eberhardt said it was possible that the North Korea deal
never crossed the ABB boardroom desk.
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- "At the time, we generated a lot of big orders in
the power generation business [worth] around $1 billion - [so] a $200 million
contract was, so to speak, a smaller one."
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- When asked whether a deal with a country such as North
Korea - a communist state with declared nuclear intentions - should have
been brought to the ABB board's attention, Eberhardt told swissinfo:
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- "Yes, maybe. But so far we haven't any evidence
for that because the protocols were never disclosed. So maybe it was a
discussion point, maybe not," says Eberhardt.
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- A Pentagon spokeswoman, Victoria Clark, recently told
Newsweek magazine that "Secretary Rumsfeld does not recall it being
brought before the board at any time."
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- It Was A Long Time Ago
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- Today, ABB says it no longer has any involvement with
the North Korean power plants, due to come on line in 2007 and 2008.
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- The company finalised the sale of its nuclear business
in early 2000 to the British-based BNFL group.
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