In the aftermath of the Dubai ports dispute, the Bush administration is hiring a Hong Kong conglomerate to help detect nuclear materials inside cargo passing through the Bahamas to the U.S. and elsewhere.
The administration acknowledges the no-bid contract with Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. represents the first time a foreign company will help run a sophisticated U.S. radiation detector at an overseas port without American customs agents present.
Freeport in the Bahamas is 65 miles from the U.S. coast, where cargo likely would be inspected again.
The administration is negotiating a second no-bid contract for a Philippine company to install radiation detectors in its home country, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press. At dozens of other overseas ports, foreign governments are primarily responsible for scanning cargo.
While President Bush recently reassured Congress that foreigners would not manage security at U.S. ports, the Hutchison deal in the Bahamas illustrates how the administration relies on foreign companies at overseas ports to safeguard cargo headed to the United States.
Hutchison Whampoa is the worldﾴs largest ports operator and among the industryﾴs most-respected companies. It was an early adopter of U.S. anti-terror measures. But its billionaire chairman, Li Ka-Shing, also has substantial business ties to Chinaﾴs government that have raised U.S. concerns.
The CIA currently has no security concerns about Hutchisonﾴs port operations, and the administration thinks the pending deal would be safe, officials said.
Supervised by Bahamian customs officials, Hutchison employees will drive the towering, trucklike radiation scanner that moves slowly over large cargo containers and scans them for radiation that might be emitted by plutonium or a radiological weapon.
Any positive reading would set off alarms monitored simultaneously by Bahamian customs inspectors at Freeport and by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials working at an anti-terrorism center 800 miles away in northern Virginia. Any alarm would prompt a closer inspection of the cargo, and there are multiple layers of security to prevent tampering, officials said.
A lawmaker who helped lead the opposition to the Dubai ports deal isnﾴt so confident. Neither are some security experts. They question whether the U.S. should pay a foreign company with ties to China to keep radioactive material out of the United States.
A low-paid employee with access to the screening equipment could frustrate international security by studying how the equipment works and which materials set off its alarms, a retired U.S. Customs investigator who specialized in smuggling cases warned. “Money buys a lot of things,” Robert Sheridan said.
Other experts discounted concerns. They cited Hutchisonﾴs reputation as a leading ports company and said the United States inevitably must rely on large commercial operators in the global maritime industry.
“We must work with these foreign companies,” said Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., a member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
A former Coast Guard commander, Stephen Flynn, said foreign companies sometimes prove more trustworthy ﾗ and susceptible to U.S. influence ﾗ than governments.
“Itﾴs a very fragile system,” Flynn said. Foreign companies “recognize the U.S. has the capacity and willingness to exercise a kill switch if something goes wrong.”
The Associated Press
