TORONTO, Feb 3: A former high-level Iraqi nuclear scientist, now living in Canada, said on Monday there is no way Iraq could possess nuclear weapons and the United States is exaggerating the potential threat for its own purposes.

Dr. Imad Khadduri, who joined the Iraqi nuclear program in 1968 and was part of a team trying to develop a nuclear bomb in the 1980s, said Iraq’s weapons program fell into shambles after the Gulf War and could not possibly have been resurrected.

“All we had after the war from that nuclear power program were ruins, memoirs, and reports of what we had done...on the nuclear weapon side I am more than definitely sure nothing has been done,” he told Reuters in an interview.

“For (US President George W.) Bush to continue brandishing this image of a superhuman Iraqi nuclear power program is a great fallacious misinformation.”

US Secretary of State Colin Powell is to deliver “compelling” proof to the UN Security Council this week that Iraq is hiding weapons of mass destruction from UN inspectors who have been combing the country for banned biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.

The former nuclear scientist, who has spoken in the past to UN weapons inspectors, said he decided to speak out publicly after the chief UN arms inspector Hans Blix sharply criticized Iraq last month for not doing enough to comply with inspections.—Reuters