The dramatic televised confession came after he met Pakistan’s President Musharraf, as both parties attempted to draw a line under the damaging affair.
The scientist looked contrite. The president suitably stern. Their meeting taking place at the apparent request of Dr Khan. A government statement saying the father of Pakistan’s nuclear bomb admitted passing on know-how to Libya, Iran and N Korean over two decades as head of Pakistan’s nuclear programme. He pleaded for clemency.
Dr Khan’s next stop was Pakistan Television. He had been under effective house arrest’ six of his former colleagues in detention. Now he prepared to address the nation - confessing and apologising for leaking nuclear secrets.
"My dear brothers and sisters, I have chosen to appear before you to offer my deepest regrets and unqualified apologies. There was never ever any kind of authorization for these activities by the government. I take full responsibility for my actions and seek your pardon,"
Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan, on Pakistan TV
The scientist hailed as a national hero for his work on the bomb, accepting sole responsibility for possibly the biggest proliferation exercise the world has seen. As for the government and the army, they knew nothing
He appealed to the public to stop any further speculation – all terribly convenient for the authorities.
And totally implausible to the relatives of other detained scientists, with whom we watched the first television reports of the meeting between Dr Kahn and the President.
They accused the government of forcing Dr Khan to make his statement.
"I am proud of Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan and his team and my father and his colleagues who have done so much by making Pakistan a nuclear state and making Pakistan so invincible. But at the same time I am shocked by the way they treated my father, the way they manhandled him, the way they treated him with disrespect. He is a national hero, along with the rest of his colleagues and instead of giving national heroes the due respect and reverence which they deserve, they completely treated them worse then criminals."
Saima Adil, daughter of one of the detained scientists
And suspicions were underlined further today by the spokesman for Benazir Bhutto, who was Prime Minister at the time when much of the proliferation took place.
He insists she knew nothing about that, but WAS party to strict security arrangements for nuclear scientists, which made it very difficult for them to engage in freelance activities.
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