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Chemical weapons sites may have been damaged by Iran quake

Special to World Tribune.com
MIDDLE EAST NEWSLINE
Monday, June 24, 2002

The United States suspects that one or more Iranian chemical weapons facilities could have been damaged or destroyed in a major earthquake in northwestern Iran over the weekend.

U.S. intelligence sources said the epicenter of the earthquake struck a region in which several CW facilities were situated. They said the facilities were producing nerve gas and other agents meant to be weaponized in Iranian missiles and bombs.

The largest facility suspected of being damaged of destroyed is located in Qazvin, about 150 kilometers west of Teheran. The plant was completed in 1988 and termed a pesticide producing facility.

"While supposedly a pesticide plant, the facility's true purpose seems to have been poison gas production using organophosphorous compounds," a 1998 report by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies said.

About 230 people Ñ a lower estimate from the original 500 Ñ were killed in the weekend earthquake, Iranian media reports said. They said the quake destroyed about 100 villages in northwestern Iran.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, responsible for the nation's WMD programs, were rushed to Qazvin to assess the damage of the earthquake to strategic facilities in the province. Army troops were also sent to help deal with any damage of the CW installations.

U.S. intelligence sources suspect that other CW facilities are based in such cities as Damghan and Parchin. They said these facilities launched operations in 1989 and were meant to produce agents for ballistic missile warheads.

Iranian parliamentarians have voiced concern over the safety of these nonconventional weapons plants. They have termed the greatest danger at the facility in Pasdaran.

The CIA said in a report earlier this year that Iran, a signator of the Chemical Weapons Convention has manufactured and stockpiled chemical weapons. These include blister, blood, choking, and probably nerve agents, and the bombs and artillery shells to deliver them.

"During the first half of 2001, Teheran continued to seek production technology, training, expertise, equipment, and chemicals from entities in Russia and China that could be used to help Iran reach its goal of having an indigenous nerve agent production capability," the report said.

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