Niger - Uranium - The Yellowcake Papers
Uranium (U) is a slightly radioactive, metallic element, naturally occurring as a measurable constituent in nearly 500 minerals. Use of uranium is heavily concentrated in a few key industries, namely nuclear fuel (other uses include industrial, medical, and military applications). The precious raw material used in making nuclear fuel rods is called Yellow Cake. Only 0.1 percent of the ore is used to make Yellow Cake - the remaining 99.9 percent is useless but still toxic and radioactive. The material is a mixture of uranium oxides, which can vary in proportion and color from yellow to orange to dark green (blackish) depending on the temperature at which the material is dried (which affects the level of hydration and impurities), with higher drying temperatures producing a darker and less soluble material.
After extraction from the ore the uranium is precipitated, dewatered by centrifugation, vacuum filtration and pressing, and dried at temperatures exceeding 125°C. The color of the product is highly dependent upon the temperature of the drying (or roasting) process. At low temperatures (less thsn 150°C) the product is the bright yellow color of ammonium diuranate or magnesium diuranate, while at higher temperatures it changes color to the olive green of U3O8 and eventually forming black UO2. As a result, the color of the final product may be yellow, green, brown, or black, depending on many process parameters. Yellowcake was commonly referred to as U3O8, because that chemical compound historically comprised the majority of the yellowcake produced by uranium recovery facilities utilizing conventional milling methods.
On 28 January 2003, President Bush delivered his State of the Union address in which he made the case for going to war with lraq. As part of his effort to justiff his conclusion that war was necessary, President Bush stated that "the British govemment has leamed that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." On 14 February 2002, CIA wrote that "infomation on the alleged uranium contract between Iraq and Nigw comes exclusively &om a foreign govement service report that lacks crucial details, and we are working to clarify the information and to detenaine whether it can be corroborated."
On 12 September 2002, President Bush delivered remarks to the United Nations which contended that Iraq was in breach of United Nations sanctions. During an interview with the House Intelligence Committee, John Gibson, who served as Director of Speechwriting for Foreign Policy at the National Security Council (NSC), stated that he tried to insert the uranium claim into this speech at the request of Michael Gerson, chief White House speechwriter, and Robert Joseph, the Senior Director for Proliferation Strategy, Counterproliferation, and Homeland Defense at the NSC.
According to Gibson, the CIA rejected the uranium claim because it was "not sufficiently reliable to include it in the speech." Gibson stated that the CIA "didn't give that blessing," the "CIA was not willing to clear that language," and "[a]t the end of the day, they did not clear it."
On 24 September 2002. the ~ricish Government published a dossier titled "Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destsuction" which stated that "...there is incelLigence chat Iraq has sought the supply of significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
On 12 and 13 January 2003 State/INR sent two messages to the CU expressing concrn "that the documents pertaining to the Iraq-Niger deal were forgeries." Only at that point did a CIA officer conducting a review of the issue discover that the CIA did not have a copy of the documents.
On 17 January 2003 CIA published a Senior Power Executive Intelligence Bricf (SPWR). It was the last CIA analytical product referenced by the paper before the President's State of the Union address. Thc SPWR ooncluded that "Fragmentary reporting on Iraqi attempta to procure uranium from various oountries in Africa in the past several years is another sign of reconstitution."
On March 7,2003, Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General of the Intemational Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), reported to the U.N. Security Council: "Based on thorough analysis, the IAEA has concluded, with the concurrence of outside experts, that these documents - which formed the basis for reports of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger - ane in fact not authentic. We have therefore concluded that these specific allegations are unfounded."
Joseph C. Wilson 4th, United States ambassador to Gabon from 1992 to 1995, wrote 06 July 2003 in The Mew York Times " ... it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place. Given the structure of the consortiurns that operated the mines, it would be exceedingly difficult for Niger to transfer uranium to Iraq. Niger’s uranium business consists of two mines, Somair and Continak, which are run by French, Spanish, Japanese, German and Nigerian interests. If the government wanted to remove uranium from a mine, it would have to notify the consortium, which in turn is strictly monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Moreover, because the two mines are closely regulated, quasi-governmental entities, selling uranium would require the approval of the minister of mines, the prime minister and probably the president. In short, there’s simply too much oversight over too small an industry for a sale to have transpired. (As for the actual memorandum, I never saw it. But news accounts have pointed out that the documents had glaring errors — they were signed, for example, by officials who were no longer in government — and were probably forged.)
At prime minister's questions 16 July 2003 Tony Blair insisted the UK claim was based not on the forged documents but on independent intelligence. He added that the link between Niger and Iraq was not an invention of the CIA or Britain. "We know in the 1980s that Iraq purchased from Niger over 270 tons of uranium, and therefore it is not beyond the bounds of possibility - let's at least put it like this - that they went back to Niger again."
The clumsy forgeries first surfaced in Rome in October 2002. One letter is dated July 30 1999 although it talks of negotiations on 29 June 2000. Another, dated 10 October 2000, was apparently signed by the Niger foreign minister, Allele Elhadj Habibou, although he ceased to be foreign minister in 1989. A logo, supposedly the national symbol of Niger, is badly drawn and minus much of the detail normally used in government documents.
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