
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, March 23, 1990                   TAG: 9003231855
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The Baltimore Sun
DATELINE: BERLIN                                 LENGTH: Short

INDICTMENT CITES PLANT IN LIBYA

Amid signs of growing tension between Bonn and Tripoli, the former head of Imhausen-Chemie, the West German company accused of helping to build a chemical weapons factory in Libya, was indicted Thursday on charges of violating West German export laws and tax evasion.

A statement from the public prosecutor's office in Mannheim, West Germany, said that Juergen Hippenstiel-Imhausen, who stepped down as Imhausen's chief Oct. 5, played a "decisive role" in the planning and construction of a facility "solely intended" to produce chemical weapons.

Libya consistently has maintained that the plant, which partly burned down last week, produces only medicines.

Peter Wechsung, the Mannheim public prosecutor, said, "The investigation leads to the conclusion . . . that the plant can make not only toxic chemicals, but was built and planned solely to produce chemical weapons."

by CNB