The Burmese junta supremo, Snr-Gen Than Shwe, is reported to be angry at government officials who are responsible for the junta’s nuclear program after he read the report of Robert Kelley, the former director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who described Naypyidaw’s nuclear program as “unprofessional” and “quite primitive.”

Snr-Gen Than Shwe wipes his head as an aide fans him in the museum attached to the Buddhist Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, in Kandy, last year. (Photo: Reuters)
According to military sources in Naypyidaw, Than Shwe’s vented his anger after he read the report—which was published by Oslo-based Democratic Voice of Burma—and assumed he had been lied to by officials such as U Thaung, the minister of Science and Technology, who had reported that Burma’s nuclear goal was close to fruition, a claim that Kelley dismissed categorically.

Citing evidence by a defector, Maj Sai Thein Win, Kelley said in his report, “Nuclear Related Activities in Burma,” that the location of the nuclear program is “primarily a headquarters site, and probably does not conduct experiments, at least with nuclear materials or explosives.”

Kelley said Burma’s military generals had little hope of success in establishing the country as a nuclear power. “It is clear that this is a very difficult task for Burma to successfully accomplish. Much of what STW [Sai Thein Win] is providing suggests Burma has little chance of succeeding in its quest, but that does not change the fact that even trying to build a bomb is a serious violation of its international agreements,” he wrote in the report.

“It would also seem that the very act of trying to build nuclear weapons is a sign of desperation and fear, no matter how unlikely it is to succeed,” he said.

“The source himself noted that the drawings from the Nuclear Battalion were very unprofessional,” he reported, adding: “This factors into our assessment that the Burmese nuclear program is quite primitive.”

During early days of the Burmese Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) rule, headed by dictator Gen Ne Win from 1962 to 1988, government officials regularly failed to report bad news or errors in calculation to the regime chief.