German guilty of aiding Libya with nukes

A German engineer was sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison Thursday after being convicted of supplying Libya with sensitive technology to use in its abandoned nuclear weapons program.Judge Juergen Niemeyer said Gotthard Lerch, 65, broke German export and weapons laws by getting uranium-enriching equipment - parts for a centrifuge system - to Libya between 1999 and 2003 despite knowing the North African nation was trying to build nuclear weapons."Libya was a good distance away from the final stages of an atomic weapon," Niemeyer said of Libya's atomic program when Lerch provided the country with illegal nuclear secrets.The charges carried a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison, but prosecutors had recommended Lerch serve six years because he admitted some involvement to the court.Federal prosecutor Wolfgang Siegmund said Lerch "made highly exclusive special knowledge available" to the Libyans for a price of €3.5 million (US$4.7 million).The Stuttgart state court said in a statement that Lerch "admitted having supported the production of ... piping systems for a gas ultra centrifuge facility in South Africa." It added that the International Atomic Energy Agency says the facility was meant for Libya's program.Prosecutors also accused him of playing a key role in the black market nuclear information network led by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan. Lerch did not address a potential connection to Khan in his admission to the court.Lerch originally went on trial in 2006, but a lower state court in Mannheim ended those proceedings, saying that prosecutors and investigators possessed documents "about which the court knew nothing," raising doubts about whether the trial could proceed fairly.Prosecutors have said Khan gave Lerch and other trusted contacts who had helped Pakistan's nuclear program the task of delivering the nuclear-related equipment to Libya. In early 2004, Khan was found to have sold sensitive technology to Iran, North Korea and Libya.Lerch was arrested in Switzerland in 2004 and extradited to Germany in 2005.Lerch has already spent 21 months in investigative custody, a common practice in Germany in security-sensitive cases. Because of this, the court on Thursday reduced the length of the sentence he will need to serve by an additional 12 months. http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1222017556093&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
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