Volume 1 - Iraq Watch

MIC Research Support at UniversitiesDocumentary evidence reveals that MIC and its companiesdivided their research projects among Iraq’smajor universities.• Baghdad University and Mustansiriyah Universityprovided general multi-discipline support to MICprojects.• Mosul University provided support to the MIC inthe areas of remote sensing and chemistry.• In another case, Basrah University provided supportin polymer chemistry.Other examples of specifi c projects sponsored by MICcompanies include:• The Al Rashid State Establishment fi nanced polymerresearch on thermal insulators for the SahmSaddam (“Saddam’s Arrow”) missile.• In 2000, Amir Ibrahim Jasim al-Tikriti, a memberof the SSO, was sent to Poland to continue hismathematics doctorate on the assumption that hewould return to the SSO upon completion of hisstudies. During that time in Poland, we judge thatthe IIS recruited or tasked al-Tikriti to facilitate thepurchase of Volga missile engines for the Iraq’s Al-Samud II missile program. ISG has corroboratingevidence that the MIC trading company ARMOSsigned the contract(s) with a Polish firm for theVolga engines, and that the IIS controlled the entireacquisition.• According to reporting, approximately 250 Volgaengines were purchased from a stock of old missilesand sent back to Iraq possibly with complicityof the Iraqi Embassy in Warsaw. Al-Karamahpurchased the engines and originally stored themat the Samud factory, and then moved them to IbnAl-Haytham.Regime Financeand Procurement• The Al Huttin Company subsidized research onreplacing brass shell casings with polyethylene.• The Al Huttin Company also funded research onheating rate problems in induction furnaces.• The Al Shahid Company fi nanced research focusingon energy loss from the safety dump of copper fromthe furnace.• The Al Qa’Qa’a Company sponsored nitrocelluloseresearch.• The Al Samud company paid for research on aninexpensive method to produce spherical ironmolds.Exploitation of Academic Exchanges forProcurementIraq’s academic exchange program—for bothstudents and professors—was used to facilitate thetransfer of dual-use technology, using home universitiesas false end users to illicitly acquire goodsin support of Iraq’s WMD programs. By sendingstudents and professors abroad, Iraq may also havebeen using both students and professors to transfer,support and advance Iraq’s intellectual and WMD“infrastructure.”Ministry of AgricultureThroughout the 1990s, the Ministry of Agriculture(MoA) procured controlled items outside UN sanctionsand then later outside the UN OFF Programfor special projects as well as legitimate agriculturalprojects. The Iraqi front company Al-Eman CommercialInvestments owned by Sattam Hamid Farhanal-Gaaod had a special relationship with the AgriculturalSupplies Committee of the MoA. According toan Iraqi businessman, Al-Eman Commercial Investmentsfrom 1990 to 2003 supplied MoA with seeds,pesticide, veterinarian medicine, harvesters, tractors,water pumps and spare parts of machinery.• Before OIF, Al-Eman periodically sent shipmentsfrom Jordan to Iraq via the Iraqi Embassy. Jordanallowed the shipment of one container a monthunder diplomatic cover that did not require inspection.• In 1995, Al-Eman purchased a kit of reagents worth$5,000 from the Swiss firm Elisa for an organizationnamed Al-IBAA, a special unit in the IraqiMoA. Al-IBAA was connected to Saddam, had aspecial research facility and was granted an unlimitedbudget. Al-IBAA was able to obtain any equipmentand support within Iraq that it needed andpaid cash for all its orders.85