Pakistan's Foreign Office has said that the disclosure made by retired President General Pervez Musharraf in his 2006 autobiography that Dr.Abdul Qadeer Khan transferred sensitive nuclear material to North Korea was a big embarrassment for the country.
Briefing the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee on Friday, representatives of the Foreign Office were quoted by the Dawn, as saying that Pakistan had to then accept that a disclosure had been made and give a standard response that it was firmly against nuclear proliferation.
A senior officer of the Foreign Office was quoted, as saying that the response was viewed internationally with scepticism and disbelief.
The Foreign Office reply came in response to a question by Senator Farhatullah Babar as to what was North Korea's official reaction to Pervez Musharraf's revelation in his memoir, In the Line of Fire, that a clandestine proliferation network operating from Pakistan had transferred nearly two dozen centrifuge machines, a flow meter and some special oils to North Korea.
"Had such an irresponsible disclosure been made by a civilian minister or a bureaucrat, he would have been sent to the gallows, but Musharraf got away with it because he was a general," Senator Farhatullah observed.
The official reaction to Pervez Musharraf's disclosures would help this committee better understand "the nature and depth" of Pakistan-North Korea relations, he added.
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