United States | Wen Ho Lee

Embarrassing

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AS A candidate for master spy, he was hardly Ian Fleming material. Neither debonair nor maniacal, Wen Ho Lee was an unassuming scientist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Nine months ago, however, the 60-year-old was accused of being the lynchpin in a nefarious Chinese plot to steal America's nuclear secrets, and has been holed up in solitary confinement ever since. Now, the government is conceding that Mr Lee was an unassuming scientist after all.

This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the headline “Embarrassing”

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