Woman Reportedly Lured Vanunu Abroad : Mossad Agent Tied to Fugitive’s Arrest

A female Mossad agent apparently lured an Israeli nuclear technician from Britain aboard a yacht where he was captured and taken back to Israel to stand trial for revealing nuclear bomb secrets, newspapers reported Sunday.

The Sunday Times, which originally reported the disclosures of Mordechai Vanunu, 31, in September, said it had uncovered evidence that a woman in her 20s met Vanunu in Britain and lured him outside that country so he could be taken into custody by the Israelis.

The woman, described as a blonde who posed as “an American cosmetic trainee on a European tour,” has not been seen since Vanunu disappeared from London on Sept. 30, the newspaper said.

Israel confirmed on Nov. 9 that Vanunu, who reported that Israel has production facilities for making nuclear weapons in a factory deep in the Negev desert, was in an Israeli jail and would stand trial for treason.

“The assumption is that she lured Vanunu offshore where he was seized by Mossad agents,” the newspaper said.

The Sunday Telegraph, quoting British police and Western diplomatic sources in Tel Aviv, said they now think the woman, known only as Cindy, “is believed to have talked Vanunu into taking a short holiday.”

The Telegraph said the sources believe they “boarded a yacht (in the south of France) for a Mediterranean cruise, and once at sea an Israeli naval patrol vessel, or boat chartered by Mossad, intercepted them.”

British police would only say they are continuing to investigate the case but would make no other comment.

The Israeli lawyer defending Vanunu, meanwhile, flew to London on Sunday, saying he will “try to obtain some information to assist my client in his defense.”

But he declined to answer further questions and refused comment on Vanunu’s return to Israel.

Left ‘of His Own Volition’

When they announced his capture, Israeli officials would only say that he left Britain “of his own volition” and no British laws had been broken in his capture. A senior Foreign Office official last week confirmed that British police had uncovered no evidence of foul play.

The Sunday Times reported that Vanunu met the woman in London the day after it informed the Israeli Embassy in London that it would publish his claim that Israel had manufactured as many as 200 nuclear weapons secretly at its Dimona nuclear power station over the last 20 years.

The newspaper said that Vanunu, who was laid off from Dimona, was “convinced he had picked Cindy up, not the other way round,” and “ignored warnings that she might not be what she claimed.”

Citing Israeli sources, the newspaper also said that then-Prime Minister Shimon Peres gave the order for Vanunu’s capture and return to Israel. But the newspaper said he did not detail the method of his capture other than to say that nothing should be done to “embarrass” the British government.