U.S. buys back supercomputer

Washington 23 Jul 99 The Energy Department's Sandia National Laboratory last week bought back a supercomputer it had sold as surplus to Korber Jiang, a Chinese citizen who is the principle of EHI Group USA and exports American goods to his home country.

Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., called Friday for Energy Secretary Bill Richardson's resignation, saying that the computer could have been used ``to design nuclear weapons.'' reports Associated Press.

``He's going around the country saying there are no problems in the Department of Energy, that everything is under control,'' Weldon said in a telephone interview. ``If there are no problems, then how can this happen?''

Neal Singer, a spokesman for Sandia National Laboratories, said that the New Mexico facility sold the Intel Paragon XPS to Korber's one-man company for $30,000 in October. After discovering Korber's nationality, Singer said, the department bought back the computer for $88,000 last week and stored it under guard at Sandia. The spokesman said the difference in cost may have been due to shipping costs incurred by Korber.

``Secretary Richardson has instituted a moratorium on any sales of surplus material that incorporates export control technology until there has been a thorough review of what happened,'' said Energy Department spokeswoman Brooke Anderson.

The transaction was first reported by Insight Magazine.

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