‘China may have provided Pak with N-weapons designs’

China might have provided its close ally Pakistan a fairly comprehensive package of proven nuclear weapons design in late 1970s and the CIA knew about it, according to a recently declassified document. ‘The CIA had evidence suggesting close Pakistan-China nuclear cooperation, to the point of facilitating a nuclear weapons capability, although the intelligence community saw this as possibly a special case based on an alliance that had existed since 1963,’ according to CIA data, obtained by the National Security Archive (NSA) under the Freedom of Information Act. According to the document, this allegation has come up before, for example in a State Department document and in major news stories but this is the first time the CIA has released some of its own information.

Significant portions of the document covering technology sharing are excised, but more may be learned if details are released under appeal, the NSA added.