IAEA to probe US report of Syrian atom reactor

VIENNA - The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog pledged on Friday to investigate what he called serious U.S. accusations that Syria secretly built a nuclear reactor with North Korean help.
Syria, which denies the U.S. allegations, accused the United States of involvement in an Israeli air attack in September that Washington says destroyed the site of an atomic reactor in a remote part of the Arab state.
Mohamed ElBaradei, director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said the allegations by U.S. intelligence against Syria would be investigated with due vigour.
"The Agency will treat this information with the seriousness it deserves and will investigate the veracity of the information," ElBaradei said in a statement.
He criticised the United States for not disclosing its intelligence information sooner. Israel should have given IAEA inspectors a chance to investigate any Syrian nuclear activity before bombing the site, he added.
ElBaradei confirmed Washington had handed over information which said that a Syrian installation destroyed by an Israeli air strike in September was an unfinished atomic reactor.
The U.S. intelligence material, which included photographs, said the suspected Syrian nuclear plant built with North Korean help was "nearing operational capability in August 2007" -- the month before the Israeli strike.
ElBaradei said in his statement: "According to this information, the reactor was not yet operational and no nuclear material had been introduced into it."
Thursday's U.S. disclosure did not amount to proof of an illicit nuclear arms programme since there was no sign of a reprocessing plant needed to convert spent fuel from the plant into bomb-grade uranium, analysts said.
"The United States and Israel have not identified any plutonium-separation or nuclear weaponisation facilities," David Albright and Paul Brannan of the Institute for Science and International Security said in an email commentary.
"The absence of such facilities gives little confidence that the reactor was part of an active nuclear weapons programme," they said. "The United States does not have any indication of how Syria would fuel this reactor..., which raises questions about when this reactor could have operated."
Syria makes comparison with Iraq
Syria compares the U.S. allegations to those made against Iraq about illegal weapons that were never found. It accused the United States of colluding in Israel's air strike.
"The U.S. administration was apparently party to the execution" of the September raid by Israeli warplanes on eastern Syria," a Syrian government statement said, without giving details. A U.S. official said Washington did not give Israel any "green light" to strike the area.
Israel is widely believed to have the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal which experts estimate at up to 200 warheads. The Jewish state has never declared its nuclear firepower as part of a "strategic ambiguity" policy to deter adversaries.
ElBaradei said Syria would have been obliged under its non-proliferation safeguards agreement with the Vienna-based IAEA to inform its inspectors in advance of any planning and construction of a nuclear facility.
But he deplored Washington's failure to turn the information over to the IAEA on the alleged reactor, said to have been launched in 2001, much earlier to help "enable us to verify its veracity and establish the facts".
"In light of the above, (I) view the unilateral use of force by Israel as undermining the due process of verification that is at the heart of the non-proliferation regime," ElBaradei added.
Syria has belonged to the 144-nation IAEA since 1963 and has one, declared small research reactor subject to U.N. inspection.
Diplomats close to the IAEA said Syria refused requests for agency inspectors to visit the alleged reactor site after the air raid. Syria subsequently razed and buried the installation and removed "incriminating equipment", Washington said.
The IAEA has been investigating the disputed uranium enrichment programme of Iran, Syria's close ally, since 2003. Iran is under U.N. sanctions for failing to prove the work is only for electricity, not atom bombs, and refusing to halt it.
The White House said the United States was convinced that North Korea had helped Syria to construct a clandestine nuclear reactor. The comment came after intelligence officials briefed U.S. lawmakers about the raid.
Under a deal North Korea struck with five regional powers, it had until the end of 2007 to disclose a complete list of its fissile material and nuclear weaponry as well as answer U.S. suspicions of enriching uranium and proliferating technology.