Friday, February 27, 2004
Ex-UN chief arms hunter says he was bugged too
Agence France-Presse Sydney, February 27
Former UN chief weapons inspector Richard Butler revealed on Friday that at least four countries bugged his conversations as he held delicate negotiations on disarming Iraq.
Responding to former British minister Clare Short's allegation that listening devices had been planted in the offices of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Butler said he was certain he was bugged in his time at the United Nations.
"Of course I was, I was well aware of it," he told ABC radio. Butler said he was bugged by the Americans, British, French and Russians.
"How did I know? Because those who did it would come to me and show me the recordings that they had made on others to help me do my job disarming Iraq. "They would say 'We're just here to help you' and they would never show me any recordings they had made on me."
Butler, executive chairman of the UN Special Commission to Disarm Iraq from 1997 to 1999, told of diplomats going to great lengths to keep conversations under wraps because they believed the UN headquarters in New York was full of spies.
"If I really truly wanted to have a sensitive conversation with somebody ... I was reduced to having to go either to a noisy cafeteria in the basement of the UN where there was so much noise around and then whisper, or literally take a walk in Central Park," he said.
© Hindustan Times Ltd. 2004.