North Korea Breaks I.A.E.A. Seals on 8,000 Spent Nuclear Fuel Rods (BREAKING)

North Korea has removed the seals and surveillance cameras installed to monitor the storage facilities containing 8,000 spent nuclear fuel rods that had been closely watched by the IAEA. A couple of days ago, the North also eliminated all IAEA`s inspection devices set up at the nuclear reactor in Yongbyon.

What makes the latest move of North more serious is the fact that the fuel rods have nothing do to with generation of electricity and can produce plutonium, which in turn can produce nuclear weapons. Therefore, the situation is spinning more and more out of control.

So far, it is believed, North Korea has dismantled surveillance devices at two of its 5 nuclear facilities whose operation had been frozen under the 1994 arms control accord in Geneva. The five facilities are the 5MW nuclear reactor in Yongbyon, the storage facility containing 8,000 spent fuel rods, the 50MW nuclear reactor whose construction was supposed to be completed sometime between 1995 and 1996, the 200MW reactor in Taechon, Pyongbook, and the radiochemical laboratory in Yongbyon

The IAEA announced on Sunday, "North Korea has taken additional actions to hinder the operation of the inspection devices on the storage facility of the nuclear wastes containing the 8,000 spent nuclear fuel rods. The storage facility is the number one target of our inspection activities."

IAEA`s Secretary General, Mohammed Elbaradei criticized, "The rods contain a considerable amount of plutonium. Therefore, it is a matter of grave concern in connection with the nonproliferation. The action North Korea took this time poses a profound hindrance to IAEA`s inspection activities to prevent the conversion of the nuclear material extracted from the spent fuel rods into production of nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosives."

Experts believe that the 8,000 fuel rods could produce 25kg of plutonium #239, which in turn could suffice to produce at lease three nuclear warheads, reported the AFP.

The facility whose seals were broken this time is in vicinity of the 5MW nuclear reactor in Yongbyon. The IAEA had double-sealed the spent fuel rods in stainless containers, and stored them in water tanks with surveillance cameras rolling over them.

One senior South Korean official said, "The IAEA bound 400 stainless containers and hang them on ropes connected above water in such a way that, if a person other than an inspector tried to temper with them, the trace must be left behind. It were these seals that North broke this time. The fuel rods, however, are still in the water tank."

North Korea`s state-run Central Agency reported on December 22 that North Korean regime started removing IAEA`s seals and surveillance cameras that had been set up under the Geneva accord. The agency announced that this action was caused by the United States` discontinuance of the fuel oil shipment.

At first, North Korea, through its Foreign Ministry spokesperson, announced that it would reactivate its nuclear program. Then, on December 21, it removed the seals and cameras on the 5MW reactor in Yongbyon.

Yesterday, South Korean government, through the comments of the Foreign Ministry, demanded, "The additional action on the part of North Korea may increase tension over the Korean Peninsula, and will amplify the concern of the international community over the nonproliferation issue."

The New York Times, citing a senior Bush administration official, reported yesterday that the United States government might consider "non-diplomatic" reactions if North got closer and closer to production of a nuclear weapon.

US State Department spokesperson also warned on Sunday that this action had caused a more serious consequence.

In the meanwhile, the Japanese government defined the removal of the seals as a violation of the 1994 accord, and protested against North Korea`s action via its embassy in Beijing.

This is the article, I was refering to. Note the date, from 1999

N Korea Said 3 Years From Hitting All 50 States With Missiles

By Dale Hurd Reporter - CBN

2-21-99

CBN News has uncovered more satellite evidence that North Korea is working to perfect a rocket capable of hitting the United States mainland-something that has been confirmed by Japan's defense agency this week.

Despite a continuing famine, this week North Korea pledged to build up its military even further. Now, a report by the Congressional Research Service explains where the North Koreans are getting some of the money for their military. Starvation has killed as much as ten percent of North Korea's population in the past three years, yet North Korea continues to advance its nuclear missile program, and threatens to annihilate the United States.

How does the North Korean regime manage not only to survive, but add to its military power? The answer is crime. North Korea is raising huge sums of cash by selling home grown opium and methamphetamines around the world, and by passing millions in counterfeit U-S currency-even as it scares the west into giving it food and cash. "The North Koreans know how to play brinkmanship. It's always to get concessions. They know how to play Washington, D.C., the Clinton Administration, and they continuously get concessions," says Dr. William Taylor, one of America's foremost experts on North Korea.

It's estimated that North Korea brings in about 100-million dollars a year by drug dealing, smuggling and other criminal enterprises. South Korea says the North prints 15-million dollars in counterfeit U-S currency each year. And criminal proceeds undoubtedly helped fund the Taepo-Dong I intermediate range missile, under development. Work also continues on a longer range missile, the Taepo-Dong II, which someday could hit targets in the western U-S. Satellite imagery shows a very large wind tunnel complex, almost the size of a football field, for testing a very large rocket. It also shows a launch pad with a road leading underground where missiles are stored.

Last year CBN News reported on an underground nuclear complex near Yongbyon where North Korea is hiding a revived nuclear weapons program. It's 25 miles from the nuclear production facility in Yongbyon. Under a 1994 agreement, this plutonium production site was supposed to be shut down. But photos from 1997 show the same type of pollution in the river as it did before the treaty. An expert has concluded the plant was still in operation.

While North Koreans starve, and the U-S gives tens of millions of dollars in food aid, it's reported that Pyongyang has been using farms to grow poppies for opium, rather than food crops. "It's a country that is starving. It can exist, the regime can exist, only on the largesse of the United States, Japan, South Korea, none of whom want a war on the Korean Peninsula," says Taylor.

So aid continues to the North, and Dr. Taylor warns that it has become the number one threat to our national security. "The North Koreans are known to have - this is clear - chemical and biological warheads. The CIA says they have already extracted enough fissionable nuclear material to build one or two nuclear devices. They are away by about three years, from being able to hit anywhere among the U-S 50 states. And we have no missile defense.

The North Koreans understand all this, and they're playing it for what it's worth." Taylor says, too, if the world would only cut off the aid, the North Korean government would fall. But that's unlikely, because of North Korea's campaign of intimidation, and the world's fear.

Thanks for asking. Here is what I know: Re: long range, they are developing the multiple stage Taepodong 2 which will give them considerable hit range in the United States. T-2 can be fielded quickly with little notice. As it is under current assessment, it is felt that they have enough capability to hit Alaska (a state of the United States the last time I checked) and much of the Pacific. With the mid ranged Nodong missiles they have already fielded, as well as Taepondong-1 they test launched in August of 1998, they threaten all of South Korea and Japan. In Japan alone, there are 38,000 American servicemen stationed there. THAAD will not be up and running I believe until 2006, unless that is excellerated. Even if it were to be accelerated to 2004 deployment, we could still have a Taepondong 2 launch in 2003, against the backdrop of plutonium extraction to make several more nukes.

Regarding re: the Korean peninsula, the prime sites in the South currently targeted by intermediate range N. Korean missiles are the following: Seoul, Osan (US Airforce site), Kunsan (US Airforce site) and several others. These are targeted at launch complexes in the western part of the DPRK, while the East Coast of the DPRK contains complexes (also from which the Taepodong was shot over northern Japan several years ago and came down in the Pacific Ocean), for striking major population centers in Tokyo.

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