New Delhi, Dec 06: With Washington having turned a "blind eye" towards the long-drawn Pakistan-North Korea nuclear nexus till it recently snowballed into a major international issue, reports here say that Islamabad had only this summer despatched a large volume of special aluminium to Pyongyang for its uranium enrichment programme. Quoting reports, official sources today said 47 tonnes of special aluminium, which was acquired by Kahuta-based Abdul Qadir Khan Research Laboratory (AQKRL) from a British firm in Blackburn, was flown to Pyongyang on board a Shaheen Airline flight in July this year.
In a recent report, the New York Times had also rejected Islamabad's claims that it had ended its exchanges with North Korea and reported that US satellites had spotted a Pakistani plane picking up North Korea's missile parts as recently as last summer.

The daily also asked Washington to "make it plain" to President Pervez Musharraf that "continued behaviour of this sort will not be tolerated."
The sources quoted US intelligence reports as saying that Pakistani assistance to North Korean nuclear programme "continued until three months ago" and added that Washington had "turned a blind eye" towards the nexus for so long. Bureau Report