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International News Title: Wikileaks: WMD program existed in Iraq prior to US invasion The release by Julian Assange's web site Wikileaks of classified documents reveals that U.S. military intelligence discovered chemical weapons labs, encountered insurgents who were specialists in the creation of toxins, and uncovered weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. However, Washington, DC officials and the news media have ignored this information. One of the WikiLeaks document dumps reveals that as late as 2008, American troops continued to find WMD in the region. There are numerous mentions of chemical and biological weapons in the WikiLeaks documents, however the U.S. media appear only interested in those portions of the leaked material that highlight actions that are viewed as embarrassing for the U.S. military such as the accusation that U.S. commanders were aware of abuse and "torture" of prisoners by Iraqi soldiers and police officers. The U.S. Defense Department continues to demand that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange immediately return the stolen military documents in his possession, including recent documents that created another stir when published, according to Elaine Wilson of American Forces Press Service. The department also wants the whistle-blowing web site to permanently delete all versions of these documents, which contain classified and sensitive information, from its web site, computers and records, Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell told reporters during a Pentagon briefing. WikiLeaks documents don't reveal evidence of a massive weapons program by Saddam Hussein — the Bush administration’s leading rationale for invading Iraq -- or some enormous stockpile of WMD, but do reveal that chemical weapons did vanish from the Iraqi battlefield. According to the latest WikiLeaks document "dump," Saddam’s toxic arsenal, significantly reduced after the Gulf War, remained intact. Jihadists, insurgents and foreign (possibly Iranian) agitators turned to these stockpiles during the Iraq conflict and may have brewed up their own deadly agents, according to the WikiLeaks web site. During that time, former Iraqi General Georges Sada, Saddam's top commander, detailed the transfers of Iraq's WMD. "There [were] weapons of mass destruction gone out from Iraq to Syria, and they must be found and returned to safe hands," Mr. Sada said. "I am confident they were taken over." Gen. Sada's comments came just a month after Israel's top general during Operation Iraqi Freedom, Moshe Yaalon, claimed that Saddam Hussein "transferred the chemical agents from Iraq to Syria." in 2004, for example, American special forces members secretly purchased what they believed to be containers of liquid sulfur mustard which have been used since World War I. Following testing in a military lab, the chemical was then secured and transferred to a secret location. Meanwhile, also in Iraq, U.S. recon soldiers inspected a suspected “chemical weapons” plant: “One of the bunkers has been tampered with,” they write. “The integrity of the seal [around the complex] appears intact, but it seems someone is interested in trying to get into the bunkers.” During the a battle in Fallujah, American forces claim they discovered a “house with a chemical lab … substances found are similar to ones (in lesser quantities located a previous chemical lab.” The following day, there was a call in another part of the Fallujah requesting "explosives experts to dispose of a chemical[weapons] cache." In addition, an armored vehicle came upon "155mm rounds filled with an unknown liquid, and several of which are leaking a black tar-like substance.” Initial tests were inconclusive. But later, “the rounds tested positive for mustard.”
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