After his 2004 confession and a televised statement of contrition, Khan was pardoned by Musharraf but has effectively been kept under house arrest in Islamabad.

Since a new civilian government took power after February elections, eclipsing Musharraf, the retired scientist has increasingly spoken out in the media. However, previously he has not implicated anyone or explicitly said that the army was aware of nuclear shipments.

His comments Friday appeared to stem from his growing frustration over the restrictions on his movements. Khan and his wife have appointed an attorney to petition the Islamabad High Court for an end to his detention.

Khan said he took sole responsibility for the nuclear proliferation because he had been persuaded that it was in the national interest. Khan said that in return he had been promised complete freedom, but "those promises were not honored."

Khan's proliferation activities are alleged to have begun in the late 1980s.

In his autobiography, "In the Line of Fire," Musharraf says that in 1999, a year after becoming army chief, he became suspicious of Khan and questioned him over reports that North Korean nuclear experts had arrived at his laboratories for secret briefings on centrifuges. Khan denied it, according to Musharraf.

Musharraf recounts authorizing a raid on a charter aircraft going to North Korea for conventional missiles after receiving reports it would be carrying some "irregular" cargo on Khan's behalf. Khan's people were tipped off before the raid and never loaded the cargo, Musharraf wrote. It was not clear if he was referring to the same shipment as Khan.

Musharraf's suspicions over Khan prompted him to remove the scientist in March 2001 from his position as head of Khan Research Laboratories, Pakistan's main nuclear lab named after him.

Pakistan says it has taken extra steps to tighten control of its nuclear assets since Khan's network was uncovered in late 2003.

Pakistan has refused to let outsiders, including those from the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency, question Khan, but says it has shared the findings of its own questioning of Khan.

In his book, Musharraf acknowledges that Pakistan had bought conventional ballistic missiles from North Korea for cash in a government-to-government deal, but says it involved no transfer of nuclear technology.

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