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Why should Malaysia be defensive about Washington's accusation of transferring nuclear technology?

THE MALAYSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, did not mince his words: the CIA director, Mr George Tenet, lied. Malaysia is not part of Pakistan's Dr A.Q. Khan's Islamic nuclear transfer of technology. The company he accused, Scomi Precision Engineering Sdn Bhd (SCOPE), did not know the parts it made for a Dubai-based Sri Lankan businessman, Mr B.S.A. Tahir, could be used for nuclear weapons. SCOPE opened its doors to journalists to prove Mr Tenet lied. It is all above board, you understand. Mr Tahir, signed a long term contract for centrifuge parts. To fulfill it, SCOPE built a factory in Shah Alam in 2001; it is a simple business transaction. It claims it did not inquire what it is used for. Is it as simple as that? SCOMI is in oil and gas exploration. It knows - at least it should - the centrigue is used in oil and gas, pharmaceuticals, nuclear technology. Yet it claims it did not want to know what it would be used for. To prove it, it brought local and foreign reporters to inspect it. The New York Times reporter was so convinced of it that it cleared SCOPE and blamed Mr Tenet. After all, the officials were so helpful. How could such nice people do something as nasty as to be part of a black market in nuclear technology?

Now, President George Bush himself returns to accuse SCOPE of being part of this black market. In his speech to the National Defense University on 11 February 2004, he returned to the theme of black marketing of nuclear technology, and spent more time on Malaysian involvement in it than the rest of the world. He also lied. But how can you tell the world he lied. Better to reject what he said. Soon after, Malaysia agreed to have the SCOPE factory in Shah Alam shut down. Why did it have to do that? Could it not have told Mr Tahir to find a new supplier, and go about its business? A factory of this type costs as much as RM100 million. It agrees to shut down after supplying RM13 million of centrifuge parts. Curiously, Mr Tahir is its only customer. In other words, SCOPE has taken a bath on it. There is more to it than is revealed.

The Prime Minister, Dato' Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, is horrified Mr Bush accuses his son's company of nuclear skulduggery. Did he not know that the Malaysian police, whom he ordered as home minister, to get to the bottom of this, has cleared SCOPE of criminal wrongdoing. So how could Mr Bush say those nasty things about his son's company? He will not therefore accept President Bush's accusations. He does not appear to have thought through this. He should distance himself from it. Malaysia does not have to justify its actions to the world because President Bush wants it to. He must edge the country back to what it should be. For a start, he should let the deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, to handle it. He should move on.

There is no international law which can accuse Malaysia or even Pakistan of what it did. The United States continues to strengthen its nuclear weaponry programmes while it threatens others from getting into it. It unilaterally decided the only nuclear powers should be restricted to those who have the technology. No new comers are allowed in after the cut-off date. The racist rationale behind it clear enough: nuclear weapon technology should be confined to the Judae-Christian countries of the West; others should not be. But Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan broke the barrier; several more are on the verge. Israel and South Africa have nuclear weapons, but their role is played down for the two countries are inextricably linked to Washington over it. The others are not. The idea of Muslim countries like Iran and Libya and communist North Korea is frightening enough in Washington, free lance transfer of technology more so.

But nuclear peace will come when more countries have nuclear weapons so that it would not be used unilaterally. Let us not forget the United States dropped the atomic bomb on Japan, not Germany, to tell the Soviet Union it has the atom bomb. Would it have used it if the Soviet Union had it too at the time? I doubt it. So now. The US can use depleted uranium cased shells in Iraq, because Iraq and its backers do not have the wherewithal to create problems for US troops in other hotspots. Why should Malaysia then be defensive about its interest in acquiring nuclear technology? The difficulty is that Malaysia went into it piece-meal, piggybacking on others in secret, denying it when found out, and surrounds itself in confusion. When there is only hegemon, all countries shiver when Washington targets it. No one stands up to question it. One who did was Tun Mahathir Mohamed. But he is retired. And he did not leave his thoughts behind as policy. So Pak Lah is left clueless and caught even more flatfooted because his son's company is involved. Malaysia is caught in this conundrum because it looks to the US to act the Islamic fundamentalists in the country so the National Front (BN) government can continue in power. It runs with the hounds and, sometimes, with the hares.

When it does that, it allows the hegemon to decide who should be in power. However one looks at it, that man is not Pak Lah but his deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak. He must know this by now. It was, remember, Washington's public support for the jailed deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, that sharpened the political debate in Malaysia. Tun Mahathir accused Dato' Seri Anwar of being Washington's stooge, amongst others, because the Pentagon gave him a right royal welcome, even inspecting a guard of honour, as it did not Dr Mahathir. If you extend this to the present situation, so did Dato' Seri Najib in Washington on a recent visit. Would Pak Lah get a similar welcome when he visits Washington? He might or he might not, depending on how loyal a poodle he could be. Dato' Seri Najib's credentials on this cannot be faulted: when he called on Mr Tenet, the great man had his legs on the table and slumped to his chair, telling him that the US is a greater power than the Roman Empire. He was insulted and, yet, he did nothing about it. Washington, I should think, knows the SCOPE factory cannot be a major link, but it is enough to unnerve Pak Lah. Why should he be rattled?

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@streamyx.com