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CNN Live At Daybreak
Nuclear Inspections in Libya
Aired December 29, 2003 - 06:22 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: U.N. weapons inspectors are on the ground and looking. They're in Libya this morning on the hunt for nuclear weapons. The chief inspector praises the cooperation he has received so far and says his inspectors have been shown equipment for uranium enrichment that could have been used to help build a nuclear bomb.
For more, on the phone live, CNN's Andrea Koppel.
Good morning -- Andrea. What exactly did they find?
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Carol, if our viewers were to think of this like as if they were baking a cake and they had a lot of ingredients laid out on the counter, but they didn't actually make the cake, that's kind of where things are right now in Libya.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the IAEA, and his team visited a couple of warehouses and a couple of labs over the weekend. These were previously secret facilities that the Libyans have just admitted to in the last 10 days or so. What they found inside were uranium centrifuge equipment. This is the type of machinery that's used to process uranium and turn it into fuel that can then go into making an atomic weapon.
Mr. ElBaradei in an interview with CNN this morning said that he believes that the nuclear program is still at an early stage. He said they were probably three to seven years away from developing a nuclear weapon.
COSTELLO: Andrea, where did they get this stuff?
KOPPEL: That is a terrific question, Carol. According to Mr. ElBaradei, there were middle men who were operating in a black market in Europe and in Asia. They were illegally exporting the equipment.
We're talking not only about the centrifuge equipment, but also uranium, and that they were illegally exporting it from countries he wouldn't name without those governments' knowledge. And for that reason, he said, it is incredibly important that the international community tighten export control regimes so that there are bigger penalties and so that governments are better at monitoring when they have nuclear programs what's going in and what's going out. But he wouldn't go into specifics as to which countries.
COSTELLO: Yes, you know...
KOPPEL: Presumably, they're going to be going after them. COSTELLO: Oh, I was just going to ask you if they were going to go after them, if anyone will be brought to justice for this.
KOPPEL: Sure. I mean, it's the same thing, believe it or not, that's been going on with Iran's nuclear program. There were various countries that are suspected to have helped Iran, again, illegally. And ElBaradei said that there were a lot of comparisons between Libya and Iran.
Now, he's going to head out today. He's going back to Vienna. He's leaving behind his inspectors, who are going to go through probably another five or so sites that Libya has only just admitted to having. These are like warehouses in the middle of the city. They're small facilities. As he put it, they don't have a flag up on top of the buildings saying, you know, secret nuclear weapons site.
So, they're going to be going through. They're going to catalog all of the equipment, the technology, so that they have a better idea, Carol, of what exactly Libya's nuclear weapons program consisted of, so that from here on out they can monitor it.
COSTELLO: And, of course, they're going to be asking for documents. And they're also going to be interviewing Libyan scientists, aren't they?
KOPPEL: That's right. And actually, I was surprised. I asked him about that earlier today. I was surprised. He told me that we're really only talking about maybe 5 or 10 scientists. He said that you don't need a lot of scientists to make this program go forward, and especially when it's done secretly.
So, it's not like they have a lot of people to talk to, but they do have, you know, a lot of nitty-gritty that they want to get into, and it's probably going to take them a number of weeks or months to finally make their way through all of this.
COSTELLO: Fascinating information. Andrea Koppel live on the phone for us this morning live from Libya.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
Aired December 29, 2003 - 06:22 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: U.N. weapons inspectors are on the ground and looking. They're in Libya this morning on the hunt for nuclear weapons. The chief inspector praises the cooperation he has received so far and says his inspectors have been shown equipment for uranium enrichment that could have been used to help build a nuclear bomb.
For more, on the phone live, CNN's Andrea Koppel.
Good morning -- Andrea. What exactly did they find?
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Carol, if our viewers were to think of this like as if they were baking a cake and they had a lot of ingredients laid out on the counter, but they didn't actually make the cake, that's kind of where things are right now in Libya.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the IAEA, and his team visited a couple of warehouses and a couple of labs over the weekend. These were previously secret facilities that the Libyans have just admitted to in the last 10 days or so. What they found inside were uranium centrifuge equipment. This is the type of machinery that's used to process uranium and turn it into fuel that can then go into making an atomic weapon.
Mr. ElBaradei in an interview with CNN this morning said that he believes that the nuclear program is still at an early stage. He said they were probably three to seven years away from developing a nuclear weapon.
COSTELLO: Andrea, where did they get this stuff?
KOPPEL: That is a terrific question, Carol. According to Mr. ElBaradei, there were middle men who were operating in a black market in Europe and in Asia. They were illegally exporting the equipment.
We're talking not only about the centrifuge equipment, but also uranium, and that they were illegally exporting it from countries he wouldn't name without those governments' knowledge. And for that reason, he said, it is incredibly important that the international community tighten export control regimes so that there are bigger penalties and so that governments are better at monitoring when they have nuclear programs what's going in and what's going out. But he wouldn't go into specifics as to which countries.
COSTELLO: Yes, you know...
KOPPEL: Presumably, they're going to be going after them. COSTELLO: Oh, I was just going to ask you if they were going to go after them, if anyone will be brought to justice for this.
KOPPEL: Sure. I mean, it's the same thing, believe it or not, that's been going on with Iran's nuclear program. There were various countries that are suspected to have helped Iran, again, illegally. And ElBaradei said that there were a lot of comparisons between Libya and Iran.
Now, he's going to head out today. He's going back to Vienna. He's leaving behind his inspectors, who are going to go through probably another five or so sites that Libya has only just admitted to having. These are like warehouses in the middle of the city. They're small facilities. As he put it, they don't have a flag up on top of the buildings saying, you know, secret nuclear weapons site.
So, they're going to be going through. They're going to catalog all of the equipment, the technology, so that they have a better idea, Carol, of what exactly Libya's nuclear weapons program consisted of, so that from here on out they can monitor it.
COSTELLO: And, of course, they're going to be asking for documents. And they're also going to be interviewing Libyan scientists, aren't they?
KOPPEL: That's right. And actually, I was surprised. I asked him about that earlier today. I was surprised. He told me that we're really only talking about maybe 5 or 10 scientists. He said that you don't need a lot of scientists to make this program go forward, and especially when it's done secretly.
So, it's not like they have a lot of people to talk to, but they do have, you know, a lot of nitty-gritty that they want to get into, and it's probably going to take them a number of weeks or months to finally make their way through all of this.
COSTELLO: Fascinating information. Andrea Koppel live on the phone for us this morning live from Libya.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
