Centerfield

IAEA Al-Qaqaa Document

Fox News has obtained and published an IAEA Action Team Confidential document dated 2003-01-14 that is a record of the monitoring inspection of Al-Qaqaa. This is the document referenced by ABC News and mentioned in an earlier post.

This is the key quote from the ABC News article:

The documents show IAEA inspectors looked at nine bunkers containing more than 194 tons of HMX at the facility. Although these bunkers were still under IAEA seal, the inspectors said the seals may be potentially ineffective because they had ventilation slats on the sides. These slats could be easily removed to remove the materials inside the bunkers without breaking the seals, the inspectors noted.

These are the exact words from the IAEA document:

All the 9 HMX bunkers were sealed after the verification by attaching metal seals on their front entrance doors. Of note was that the sealing of the bunkers was only partially effective because each bunker had ventilation shafts on the sides of the buildings. These shafts were not sealed, and could provide removal routes for the HMX while leaving the front door locked.

Note the difference between the ABC News description of the document and the actual document: whereas ABC News uses the phrase "ventiliation slats," the IAEA document uses the phrase "ventiliation shafts." Perhaps the ABC reporter was describing slats that partially covered the shafts. In any event, the use of the word "shaft" causes me to visualize a larger opening into the bunkers than I did before reading the IAEA document.

What we don't have is an explanation for the IAEA allowing the bunkers to be constructed in a manner that "could provide removal routes for the HMX while leaving the front door locked." The bunkers were not really sealed, and the IAEA knew it. Maybe the Bush administration had some good reasons for not trusting the UN inspectors.