WASHINGTON, Dec 6: An official report on a State Department Web site quotes a senior Bush administration official as saying that Pakistanis regard Dr A.Q. Khan as a "traitor to Pakistan".
The report, still on display at the Washington File, an official site of the US State Department, also quotes President Pervez Musharraf as telling US President George W. Bush that he believed it was "absolutely in Pakistan's interest" to uncover the remaining elements of the so-called Khan network of nuclear proliferators.
The author, Stephen Kaufman, is the Washington File's White House correspondent who bases his report on a briefing by an unnamed senior Bush administration official.
"Asked about the nuclear proliferation network run by Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan, the official said Mr Bush was grateful to Mr Musharraf for his 'decisive move' to roll up the network, especially since the move against Khan was initially unpopular among the Pakistani public," the report says.
He quotes the official as telling him that Pakistanis "have come to recognize that A.Q. Khan was a traitor to Pakistan and a threat to Pakistan's interests, and have supported President Musharraf's efforts to crack down on the A.Q. Khan network and work with us".
"As a result, a good volume of information was provided that helped US and other international authorities dismantle the network," the report said. "It allowed us to roll up some pretty significant proliferation networks that we would never have known about," the official told the Washington File.
But the official says that "more work remains to be done" and President Musharraf feels it is "absolutely in Pakistan's interest" to continue to uncover any remaining elements of the network.
