Authorities have detained a key aide to the father of Pakistan's atom bomb for questioning as they investigate reports of the possible transfer of nuclear technology to Iran, Pakistani officials said Sunday. 

Pakistan questioned Abdul Qadeer Khan, revered as a national hero for developing the nuclear device, and several of his colleagues in recent weeks after a UN nuclear agency began a probe into possible links between the Pakistani and Iranian nuclear programs.

A senior government official said Islam-ul-Haq, Khan's principal secretary, was detained for questioning on Saturday evening in Islamabad. "He was rounded up in connection with the probe of the Iranian nuclear program," said the official, who asked not to be named.

Pakistan says some of its scientists may have been driven by "personal ambition or greed" to export technology to Iran but denies the government itself was ever involved in such technology transfer.

The detention of Haq came hours after President Pervez Musharraf said Pakistan faced serious accusations of spreading terrorism and nuclear technology.

"Our nuclear and missile power is for the defence of Pakistan," Musharraf told a noisy parliament session on Saturday.

"But we have to assure the world that we are a responsible nation and we will not allow proliferation of nuclear weapons."

The New York Times on Saturday quoted US law enforcement officials as saying they were looking into whether the Pakistani Government was involved in a plot by a South African businessman to export trigger devices that could be used for nuclear weapons.

It quoted a Pakistani diplomat in Washington as saying Islamabad would cooperate in the investigation but denied its involvement in the export deal.

(China Daily January 19, 2004)