from TPDL 2000-Mar-27, from Insight Magazine, by Douglas Burton:

Clinton Fund-Raiser Trie Remains Under Investigation

House Government Reform Committee investigators plan to keep questioning Clinton fund-raiser Charlie Trie in connection with controversial transfers of dual-use technology to the People's Republic of China, or PRC, that he arranged in 1993, news alert! has learned [see ``Trie's Deadly Deals,'' March 20]. As reported in this magazine, Trie's company, Daihatsu International Trading Inc., acted as a conduit for the sale of sophisticated medical fermenters to a medical-research lab in China that allegedly is involved in producing biological weapons.

Some experts on dual-use weapons transfers to the PRC are concerned about Trie's sale of the two 500-liter fermenters to the Changjung Biological Products Institute, a transfer that seems to have eluded investigation by the FBI on President Clinton's watch.

Committee spokesman Mark Corrallo tells news alert!, ``The story [in Insight] is completely accurate, but that's all we have.'' Corrallo says that the investigation of Trie is continuing.

Rep. Bob Barr, a Georgia Republican, questioned Trie at length during a Government Reform Committee hearing on March 1. Afterward, Barr stated: ``Not only did Charlie Trie directly assist the Chinese military in accessing the top political echelons of the Democratic Party, he also helped them obtain the means to manufacture new weapons of mass destruction. Such weapons directly threaten American lives. Standing by idly while they proliferate is unconscionable. If President Clinton is serious about leaving an important legacy to the American people, he should investigate Trie and his other friends who have endangered American lives in their relentless pursuit of campaign cash.''

Beijing insists that it never has researched, manufactured, produced or possessed biological weapons and that it would never do so. However, according to Proliferation Threat and Response, published by the Defense Department in 1997, ``China possesses an advanced biotech-

nology infrastructure and the biocontainment facilities necessary to perform research and development on lethal pathogens.'' The government report further states: ``Moreover, China likely has maintained the offensive biological warfare program it is believed to have had before acceding to the Biological Weapons Convention.''

Stephen Bryen, former deputy undersecretary of defense for trade-security policy in the Reagan administration, tells Insight: ``These are the same types of fermentation tanks that we stopped from going to Iraq some years ago, though they got them anyway from the Swiss.'' Bryen adds: ``I would guess that the Chinese are fairly far along on chemical- and biological-weapons development, although it is hard to get much information. The problem of control boils down to the fact that no one [in the Clinton administration] is asking for the intelligence on these tech transfers.''