Israel frees Vanunu

[peekaboo]

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/...el-vanunu.html

ASHKELON, Israel (Reuters) - Israeli nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu emerged defiant after 18 years in prison Wednesday, saying he was proud of revealing secrets that exposed the Jewish state as an atomic power.

Vanunu flashed victory signs and waved as he walked through the gates of Ashkelon's Shikma Prison, where supporters cheered him as a "peace hero'' and counter-demonstrators booed him with chants of "Shut up, atomic spy.''


"I am proud and happy to do what I did,'' the gray-haired, former nuclear technician said standing before a bank of television cameras.

Vanunu's 1986 revelations to a British newspaper about the top-secret Dimona reactor led analysts to conclude Israel had amassed an arsenal of 100 to 200 nuclear warheads, one of the world's largest stockpiles.

Vanunu, 49, complained bitterly of "cruel and barbaric treatment'' at the hands of Israel's security services but insisted he had no more state secrets to divulge after serving his full term for treason and espionage.

Fearing he could reveal more classified information, the government put him under close police surveillance and slapped restrictions on his movements, including a one-year ban on travel abroad.

Vanunu refused to answer questions in Hebrew during an impromptu news conference broadcast live on state television, saying he was protesting against Israel's prohibition on his contacts with foreigners.

"Israel doesn't need nuclear arms, especially now that all the Middle East is free from nuclear arms... My message today to all the world is open the Dimona reactor for inspections,'' he said.

Vanunu, a Christian convert, made his first stop at an Anglican cathedral near Jerusalem's Old City, where he said he went "to give thanks to my friends and to my God.''

PARTING VEIL OF SECRECY

Vanunu leaked pictures and details of the Dimona nuclear reactor where he had worked to Britain's Sunday Times newspaper in 1986.

His disclosures parted the veil on Israel's official policy of "strategic ambiguity'' about its nuclear program and its cryptic pledge that it would not be the first to introduce atomic weapons to the Middle East.

A blonde agent of Israel's Mossad spy agency lured Vanunu from London to Rome, where he was abducted and brought home. He was convicted of treason in a closed-door trial and sentenced to 18 years in prison, much of it spent in solitary confinement.

Vanunu said Israeli security agents tried to rob him of his sanity during his long imprisonment. ``I said to (them)...You didn't succeed to break me. You didn't succeed to make crazy.''

Vanunu said he wanted to leave Israel, where resentment against him runs so deep that his brother has voiced fears for his safety. He has many supporters overseas, where international peace activists have regularly nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize.

But for now, media reports say Vanunu will live in a luxury apartment complex in the southern Tel Aviv neighborhood of Jaffa close to a church where he can attend prayers.

He will be barred from approaching ports and border crossings. The Defense Ministry said the restrictions were due to "a tangible danger...that Vanunu wishes to divulge state secrets, secrets that he has not yet divulged.''

British actress Susannah York, among the anti-nuclear campaigners who came to Israel to celebrate Vanunu's release, said: "It's a gross violation of human rights.''

Those greeting him included an American couple who adopted him. Most of his family have disowned him.

Vanunu will be bound by a non-disclosure agreement he signed when he was hired to work at the reactor in the southern desert town of Dimona in 1976, security officials say.

Israel has refused to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, thus keeping Dimona closed to international inspection.

[Marylux]