RUMSFELD SAT ON BOARD OF COMPANY THAT SOLD REACTORS TO NORTH KOREA:
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was the only American to sit on the
board
of a company which six years ago sold two light water reactors to North
Korea.
"Rumsfeld was a non-executive director of ABB, a European engineering
giant
based in Zurich, when it won a $200m contract to provide the design and
key
components for the reactors. The current defense secretary sat on the
board
from 1990 to 2001, earning $190,000 a year."
While conservatives now fault President Clinton for selling the light
water
reactors to North Korea under the previous Agreed Framework, few cite
Rumsfeld's role in the deal.
Rumsfeld has never acknowledged that he knew the company was competing for
the nuclear contract. In response to questions about his role in the
reactor
deal, the Defense Secretary's former spokeswoman Victoria Clarke told
Newsweek in February 2003 that "there was no vote on this" and that her
boss
"does not recall it being brought before the board at any time." ABB
spokesman Bjoern Edlund told Fortune magazine at the time that "board
members were informed about this project."
One former director who sat with Rumsfeld on the board said they were told
about the contract. "This was a major thing for ABB," the former director
said, "and extensive political lobbying was done." The director recalled
being told that Rumsfeld was asked "to lobby in Wa****ngton" on ABB's
behalf.
A few years after participating in the deal, Rumsfeld attacked the concept
of selling reactors to North Korea. In a speech at the Heritage
Foundation,
Rusmfeld said, "Our present nuclear agreement with North Korea
unfortunately
does not end its nuclear menace. It merely postpones the reckoning, with
no
assurance that we will know how much bomb-capable material North Korea
has."
http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?key=204507736&url_num=60&url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/korea/article/0,2763,952289,00.html
WOW!
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