Police deny new WMD arrest
2004-09-27 12:14
Johannesburg - Police and prosecution authorities denied on Monday arresting another person over the weekend in connection with an international investigation into Libya's now abandoned nuclear weapons programme.
Weekend reports said an engineer bearing dual Swiss/South African nationality suspected of selling nuclear equipment to Libya was arrested in Cape Town.
However, police spokesperson Director Sally De Beer and Richard MacAdam, the prosecutor opposing bail for two men already in custody in connection with the investigation, said there had been no more arrests.
Randburg engineering firm managing director Gerhard Wisser and Daniel Geiges, a director at the company, were arrested earlier this month on two charges under the Non-Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction and Nuclear Energy Acts.
They face four charges relating to alleged import and export of equipment that could be used to enrich uranium, which in turn could be used to make weapons of mass destruction.
Their arrests came on the same day similar charges were dropped against Vanderbijlpark engineering company director Johan Meyer, who has turned state witness.
A spokesperson at the Swiss embassy in Cape Town said there had been no further arrests of dual Swiss/South African nationals in South Africa since early September.
A decision on the bail application of Geiges, who is of Swiss/South African nationality, and Wisser, who is of German origin, will be made known at the Vanderbijlpark regional court on Tuesday.
- SAPA