Pakistan pledges IAEA cooperation
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Anti-government demonstrators in Karachi protest in defense of nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan.
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A top Pakistani scientist asks the nation for forgiveness.
Scientist confesses to giving nuclear technology to N. Korea, Iran and Libya.
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ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistan's foreign minister said his country would cooperate fully with the U.N.'s atomic agency after the nation's top nuclear scientist admitted he gave weapons secrets to other countries.
Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, apologized on national television for transferring nuclear technology to Iran, North Korea and Libya, and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf pardoned Khan.
Mohammad ElBaradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), called the scientist's revelations "just the tip of the iceberg," an IAEA official told CNN following Khan's admission.
The official said ElBaradei was aware of individuals and companies in at least five other countries in Africa, Europe and Asia in the business of proliferating of nuclear technology.
Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri said Pakistan would cooperate with the IAEA in "every conceivable way" as "responsible members of the international community."
"They would like to find out if the information given to them is accurate," he said. "We will cooperate in providing all the information that has come our way."
Kasuri's counterpart in nuclear neighbor India, Yashwant Sinha, said Friday the proliferation scandal was a matter of international concern and suggested an international investigation be conducted.
On Saturday, Kasuri said that the IAEA was not an investigative agency and that Pakistan had been thorough and transparent in its own probe.
"Nobody has been spared," he said. "(Khan has) been forced to admit all the mistakes he has made. Nothing was swept under the carpet. Nothing was hidden. It was in broad daylight. It lasted 60 days.
Kasuri said Khan was "a national hero," and noted that some Pakistanis "have actually attacked us ... saying why have we humiliated a national hero the way we've done."
"It's like trying Charles Lindbergh or Albert Einstein and asking him to confess the mistakes that he's made," Kasuri said.
"We have done what very few countries in the world have done, and we've done it because we wish to be treated as a responsible member of the international community and a responsible nuclear weapons state."
Musharraf pardoned Khan Thursday, a day after he accepted responsibility and apologized in a statement broadcast on national television. "Much of it is true," Khan said of the allegations.
In announcing the pardon, Musharraf said Khan and the scientists who worked for him were motivated by "money." He granted the pardon for Khan after it was recommended by Pakistan's Federal Cabinet, he said.
Military officials said nuclear weapons-related designs and components were smuggled to Iran in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Nuclear technology was transferred to North Korea and Libya in the 1990s.
The military officials said their information was based on debriefing sessions with Khan. In addition they said they had independent confirmation of some of the transfers.
