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- WORLD, Page 71World NotesIRAQSpiking the Big Guns
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- Although Iraq agreed last April to relinquish any nuclear,
- chemical, biological or ballistic weapons in its possession as
- a condition for a cease-fire in the Persian Gulf war, it
- probably never envisioned the scene that took place in the
- mountains north of Baghdad last week. While United Nations
- experts looked on, Iraqi workers slit holes in the barrels of
- five "superguns" that Baghdad could have used to hurl shells at
- neighbors 400 miles away.
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- At the same time, concern about the scope of President
- Saddam Hussein's nuclear program increased when U.N. officials
- disclosed that secret documents seized by an inspection team
- last month showed Iraq had produced small amounts of lithium-6,
- a chemical used only in hydrogen bombs. The substance was kept
- at the Al-Atheer weapons center 40 miles south of Baghdad, a
- facility virtually unscathed by the war. While a team of experts
- flew to Iraq to begin searching for evidence of a potential
- H-bomb, the U.N. Security Council drafted a resolution aimed at
- preventing Iraq from ever regaining a nuclear capability. The
- provisions for mandatory reporting by Baghdad sound overly
- optimistic, given Saddam's past deceptions.
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