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Last week Australian newspaper Herald Sun published an article by Laurie Nowell on the 2001-02 sale of Ukrainian cruise missiles to Iran and China that contained new and quite sensational information that the sales included nuclear warheads. Unfortunately, this article contains serious errors and important omissions. International research team burtsev.ru has written about the perpetrators of this international crime for several years. Today we quote Nowell's article in full with our comments and glosses.
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June 07, 2009
SARFRAZ Haider died when the quad bike he was riding hit a wall at relatively low speed in Cyprus in January, 2004.
The bizarre, but seemingly innocuous accident that took the life of the Australian businessman was treated almost perfunctorily by the local police.
But for Mr Haider's family it was the culmination of a bizarre plot -- worthy of a spy thriller -- in which nuclear missiles were allegedly stolen from the Russians and sold to Iran for $63 million.
Mr Haider's eldest son, Sam, has revealed the story of his father's shadowy life to the Sunday Herald Sun after spending four years and thousands of dollars trying to get to the truth. He plans to write a book on the saga.
He has pieced together details of his father's life, along with deals from company records and the accounts of his business associates.
And an investigation by this newspaper has confirmed the details of many of his claims.
"It is amazing to me, but my dad was an arms dealer who was turning over hundreds of millions of dollars," Sam said this week.
"He was close to some seriously dangerous people and he lived an incredible, jet-set life.
"But in the end, I believe, it caught up with him. The deals and the intrigue, that's what killed him."
Sarfraz Haider, an Australian citizen of Afghan-Iranian origin, lived in Canberra and Sydney for almost two decades before leaving his family and moving to London and then Cyprus in 2000.
He became one of the world's leading arms dealers who is said to have brokered deals worth more than $10 billion. His code name was "Dex".
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia's nuclear arsenals in its satellite states were dismantled and sent home, or destroyed.
In the Ukraine, in 2001, some of this arsenal disappeared.
Up to 20 nuclear-capable Kh-55 missiles -- with a 3000km range -- and four 200-kiloton nuclear warheads were stolen by a shadowy group of former Russian and Ukrainian intelligence and military officers.
What happened to these weapons is the subject of international debate and much speculation.
But one version of events, supported by documents obtained from the Ukrainian parliament and the investigations of the Haider family, is that they ended up in Iran and China.
Letters written by Hryhoriy Omelchenko, a former intelligence colonel to Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko, give details of the arms deal. The letters also confirm Mr Haider, 53, was suspected of being part of the arms trafficking gang that sold the missiles to Iran and China.
The group used a fake contract and end-user certificate with Russia's state-run arms dealer and with a company called Ukrspetseksport -- Ukraine's weapons exporting agency -- to conceal the sale of the weapons that were officially listed as destroyed, the letters reveal.
While wrangling with lawyers and local officials over his father's estate in Cyprus, Sam Haider was contacted by a man called Ruslan Saidov, who claimed to be a friend and business associate of Sarfraz.
"Saidov told me the whole story," said Sam, who runs a Sydney import-export business.
"He said the theft of the missiles was masterminded by the partners of an intelligence and military consultancy firm called Far West Ltd.
"He said my father had been killed because the people at Far West and their Iranian partners feared the Americans would get to him and make him tell them about the missiles.
"They feared that he knew too much information about their dealings, and knew more information than anybody else."
Far West's partners, all former Russian or Ukranian military or intelligence officers, had close contacts with military figures and mafia groups within Russia and its former satellites.
They spirited the missiles out of the Ukraine and shipped them to Cyprus under the auspices of a company called SH Heritage Holdings -- whose owner and sole director was Sarfraz Haider.
The missiles were crated up and marked as "turbine parts" intended for Iran's oil industry.
Six of the missiles and two warheads were then allegedly shipped to Iran with the acquiescence of the Iranian secret service.
Six more missiles and another two warheads were shipped to China.
The deals were said to be worth more than $126 million.
Mr Saidov revealed himself to Sam Haider as one of the partners in Far West.
Another partner, Oleg Orlov, was arrested in the Czech Republic in 2005 over the missile theft.
He was extradited to the Ukraine, but died in jail after his throat was slit.
A third partner, Vladimir Filin, has disappeared.
Six men were eventually indicted over the missile sales and Ukrainian businessman Sergei Petrov, a former a partner in Far West, blew the whistle to German authorities on other illicit arms deals.
He alleged Far West had smuggled portable surface-to-air missiles to FARC guerrillas in Colombia in return for 600kg of cocaine,
He also accused Far West of supplying weapons -- including mortars, assault rifles and ammunition -- to ethic Albanians in the Macedonian conflict and Palestinians attacking Israeli targets.
Petrov was later blown up in his own car around the time Sarfraz Haider died.
Another member of the gang, Valery Malev, who was based in Kiev, died in mysterious circumstances in 2002.
Sam Haider claims the fortune his father amassed selling arms has largely disappeared.
He blames Mr Haider's business partners, and local lawyers and officials in Cyprus.
"The money has all gone and no one can tell us where it is," he said.
"When we went to Cyprus to find out what had happened we were met with brick walls."
Up to $12.6 million is missing from Mr Haider's accounts, and there are doubts about the fate of his properties in Cyprus, Sam claimed. At the heart of the mystery is the role of Mr Haider's mistress and her family, who are allegedly linked to the Russian mafia.
He said the chance discovery of a memory stick hidden inside his father's mattress was the first clue to the scale and seriousness of the arms deals.
"We couldn't believe it. We found this USB stick and on it were all these records of deals and financial transactions," Sam said.
The family never accepted the official "accidental" finding on Mr Haider's death, but an autopsy on his body, conducted by his brother, Dr Tedo Haider, from Batlow in NSW, heightened their suspicions.
Dr Haider claims his brother's neck had been broken, his aorta split and there were signs of a struggle.
"We want the truth to come out and we want justice," Sam said.
"This story needs to be told. There needs to be an accounting, and the world needs to know what is going on with these arms deals.
"We think there has been a cover- up. We think people have been paid off; my father's death and the events surrounding it need to be investigated properly."
Sam said he has been told his father had close connections to Iran's secret service, that he was the go-between for the Iranians in gaining nuclear secrets from the Pakistani atomic engineer A.Q. Khan, and that in 1986-87, he oversaw shipments of special military equipment and technical co-operation to Iran from Russia.
"The sale of the missiles, Far West's involvement in it and the links to the A.Q. Khan syndicate in Pakistan -- I believe that's what led to my father's murder," Sam said.
At the time of his brother's death, Dr Haider asked the then Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and Attorney General Philip Ruddock to intervene.
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation has a file on the case and the Australian Federal Police and Interpol carried out an investigation in Cyprus.
However, according to an AFP source the results were "inconclusive".
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25597778-5006016,00.html
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Natasha Barch (Moscow Chapter of burtsev.ru) discusses the article in Herald Sun with Vadim Stolz, chairman of the International Editorial Board of burtsev.ru.
NB. Did Saidov indeed tell Sam Haider “the whole story” about the international crime that had led to the murder of his father Sarfraz Haider?
VS. No, he didn't. Which is not surprising at all, given Saidov's important role in this crime and his well-deserved reputation of the “Azef of the Caucasus.” What is surprising is that Sam Haider, who claims that he has found the memory stick with all of his father's transactions, apparently bought Saidov's story about the bad Iranians who whacked his father because they were afraid that Americans would learn about the deal. Yet, it is well-known by now that behind this deal was the US private intelligence company Diligence LLC, co-founder of Far West Ltd. The board of Diligence includes the cream of U.S. intelligence and military-industrial complex. This information was leaked by Yulia Timoshenko's people. In fact, Sam's account confirms the key part of the story leaked by the Ukrainians.He said that in 1986-87 Sarfraz Haider took part in the transfer of “special military equipment” from the Soviet Union to Iran. This transfer was initiated and supervised by Yuri Masluikov, Leonard Vid, and Alexander Fain – high-ranking bureaucrats of the military-industrial complex, who worked in close coordination with the GRU – military intelligence. Because of this, according to the Ukrainians, the Iranians trusted them. By the 2000s Vid and Fain became important CEOs of the monstrous Alpha-Group and Alpha Bank whose board included Diligence LLC directors like Richard Burt. It is through Vid and Fain that people close to Dick Cheney lured the Iranians into the deal, allegedly in order to create a casus belli. So the information that Sarfraz Haider was privy to the Soviet-Iranian arms trade and apparently personally knew Vid and Fain confirms this story.
This was an operation conceived by the Apocalyptic wing of US Right-Wingers, Neocons, and Post-Nazis and organized by FarWest and their partners in Kiev and Moscow. It is these rogue elements, some of them close to the White House and the Kremlin, who wanted to protect themselves by eliminating the front men like Sarfraz Haider, and Far West did this “job” too, it was a part of what they were paid to for.
NB. But can you imagine Saidov coming to the son of the man he had killed and telling him why it was done?
VS. Absolutely! That's why Sam's account rings so true for me. This is exactly their signature. Saidov, Filin, Lunev, and the rest of them are proud of their “professionalism.” For Saidov it was “professional” to take care of Sam after his killers did their job on Sarfraz. Saidov could not eliminate Sam, Sarfraz's death and the KH-55 deal had already drawn too much attention before Sam and other relatives came to Cyprus and began to suspect a foul game. What Saidov could do was to tell him a plausible story that would scare Sam to death and make him stop digging into his father's death. And Saidov did a good job of it! Sam has been silent all these years, even after he allegedly found that “memory stick.” But something happened recently, something that might have to do with power change in Washington.
NB. So what exactly did happen that made him come forward and that tabloid to publish his story?
VS. This is a “million dollar” question. My first and last thought on this is that it has something to do with Victor Bout's affair and the decision on his extradition to the United States that is due by the Thailand court in August. Bout's planes were used for getting the stuff from Ukraine to Iran. If they give Bout to the Americans it could become a political equivalent of the present economic crisis. Nowell's article raises the stakes even higher, because it claims that the conspirators sold Iran and China not only the missiles but also – four 200-kiloton nuclear warheads designed for these missiles to carry. Just imagine that people, close to the highest level of power during Bush's presidency, had armed “those mullahs” in Tehranwith some of the most advanced nuclear weapons. If true, this is the end of the world, politically speaking. Obama can wipe out his most dangerous enemies with one strike—and I must add the most dangerous people for the American people and the rest of the world—he can wipe them out for good and begin a truly new chapter in US and world history.
NB. I see it rather as a warning or something. I just don't believe that Obama's people can go that far. But let's wait and see. For now I just want you to correct some factual mistakes in Nowell's piece and fill in the most glaring omissions.
VS. I'll point out only to several errors and suggest reading our materials for more education on this topic. Nowell is dead wrong saying that Far West partners are only “Russian or Ukrainian military or intelligence officers” (He should also take a remedial course in English composition if they offer any in Australia). This is the most well-known area of “FarWest studies.” The principal “Russian-speaking” part of Far West LLC (previously Far West Ltd) includes: Generals Vladimir Filin (born Litovchenko), Vice-president, and Alexei Likhvintsev (born Kolosovskii) of the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukrainian Defense Ministry; General Valery Lunev of Belorussian KGB (cover name); General Ruslan Saidov (born Sadulaev), Vice-President, Defense Ministry of Uzbekistan and the head of the illegal external intelligence service of the Chechen Republic; Ret. Colonel of Russian General Staff Anton Surikov aka Mansur Natkhoev aka US citizen Gregory G. Orloff.
The president of Far West LLC is Saudi Prince Rasheed ar Rasheed, senior intelligence officer and a relative of Prince Turki al-Faisal. The board includes also one Ruslan Berenis, senior officer of British military intelligence. In addition, KBR has a 13% stake in this company. The company's principle US connections are Fritz Ermarth, Robert Gates, Robert Kagan, Zeyno Baran, and Fiona Hill of the CIA.
In other words, this is a powerful international cabal that reaches equally wide and deep into the inner sacrum of Atlantism and Sufi brotherhoods, US intelligence and the Pan-Turkist underground.
Nowell's account of the “strange deaths” of the front men is also misleading.
Oleg Orlov, Viktor Bout's associate, was strangled in the Kiev jail on the orders of Filin and Likhvintsev. Filin did not disappear, but remains a key figure in the fascist neo-Banderovite core in Ukrainian military and secret services; he is one of the power brokers behind the scene of Ukrainian politics. Those who read Russian can learn about his ideas from his own mouth in his blog at www.far-west.livejournal.com .
Finally, it is unlikely that Sam's father was a go-between Iranians and A. Q. Khan. Khan is a purely decorative figure, a fall guy. The real players in the nuclear WMD game are intelligence services and rogue groups of intelligence officers in the United States, Ukraine, Russia, Belorussia, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran, China, and North Korea – The Consortium.
Liquidation of Oleg Orlov and the Problem of 2008
Ukrainian Deputy Asks U.S. Ambassador Taylor to Clarify US Position on Ukraine's Nuclear Status
US Companies Linked to Vice-President Cheney Supervised the Transfer of Ukrainian WMD to Iran
Far West, Ltd. Leaves Europe Under the Threat of Criminal Prosecution. Renamed Far West, LLC
New Information on the Involvement of Far West, Ltd in Illegal Arms Smuggling
Peter Dale Scott . The Global Drug Meta-Group: Drugs, Managed Violence, and the Russian 9/11
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