Friedrich Tinner

Friedrich Tinner is a Swiss engineer, connected with the Khan network trafficking in the proliferation of nuclear materials and know-how to Pakistan, Iran, Libya, and North Korea. he has been connected in particular with gas centrifuges used for isotopic enrichment of uranium.

His 43 year-old son Urs Tinner has been in custody since 2004 as a suspect in the same network. cite journal
title=Nuclear bomb blueprints for sale on world black market, experts fear
work=The Guardian
author=Ian Traynor
url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/may/31/nuclear.internationalcrime?gusrc=rss&feed=networkfront
date=May 31, 2008] cite web
title=Swiss engineer arrested in Libyan nuclear probe
url=http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/front/Swiss_engineer_arrested_in_Libyan_nuclear_probe.html?siteSect=105&sid=5271948&cKey=1097670669000&ty=st
date=October 13, 2004
publisher= [http://www.swissinfo.ch swissinfo.ch] ] His brother, Marco Tinner, is also in custody on similar charges.cite web
title=Engineers to remain in jail over nuclear probe
url=http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/search/Result.html?siteSect=882&ty=nd&sid=9452097
date=August 8, 2008
publisher= [http://www.swissinfo.ch swissinfo.ch] ]

In May, the President of the Swiss Confederation, Pascal Couchepin announced that the Tinner files, believed to number around 30,000 documents, had been shredded. This was justified to avoid them, "getting into the hands of a terrorist organisation or an unauthorised state", according to Couchepin. However it is alleged that this was a cover-up, to hide the involvement of Urs Tinner with the CIA.cite journal
title=In Nuclear Net’s Undoing, a Web of Shadowy Deals
url=http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/25/world/25nuke.html?pagewanted=1&em
work=New York Times
date=August 24, 2008
author=William J. Broad and David E. Sanger] cite web
title=US delivers legal aid in nuclear probe
url=http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/front/US_delivers_legal_aid_in_nuclear_probe.html?siteSect=105&sid=7301039&cKey=1164805998000&ty=st
date=November 28, 2006
publisher= [http://www.swissinfo.ch swissinfo.ch] ] Although the Swiss government claimed that the shredding was a security requirement of the IAEA as a measure against nuclear proliferation, it is widely alleged that this was done solely under American pressure, either to hide their involvementcite web
title=Did Switzerland give in to US pressure?
url=http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/search/Result.html?siteSect=882&ty=st&sid=9152887
date=May 30, 2008
publisher= [http://www.swissinfo.ch swissinfo.ch] ] or to avoid damage to their own propaganda.cite web
title=Pakistani nuclear expert denies supplying plans
url=http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/search/Result.html?siteSect=882&ty=nd&sid=9248404
date=June 22, 2008
publisher= [http://www.swissinfo.ch swissinfo.ch]
quotation=Khan alleged that the shredding was done under pressure from the US government. "If Switzerland had declassified these documents, it would have taken the wind from the sails of US propaganda," he said.] Swiss senator Dick Marty has questioned the need for their destruction, pointing out that they could merely have held secret.cite web
title=Cabinet comes under fire over nuclear documents
url=http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/search/Result.html?siteSect=882&ty=st&sid=9168448
date=June 3, 2008
publisher= [http://www.swissinfo.ch swissinfo.ch] ]

See also

* A. Q. Khan

* cite web
title=Presentation to the NRC about LES EIS
url=http://www.nrc.gov/materials/fuel-cycle-fac/comments/ml040770046.pdf
quotation=In the 1970's, Friedrich Tinner was in charge of exports at Vakuum-Apparate-Technik, or VAT.
author=Lee Cheney
date=March 4, 2004
pages=pp. 10-12
format=PDF: LES refers to Louisiana Energy Services

* cite book
title=The Nuclear Jihadist
last=Frantz |first=Douglas
coauthor=Catherine Collins
isbn=0446505609
publisher=Grand Central Publishing
date=2007

References