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

Dong-a Ilbo News (Seoul, Korea) ^ | 23 December 2002 | Dong-a Ilbo News (S.Korea)

[wcbtinman]

"Rumsfeld just confirmed they will not let North Korea go further..."

He may fervently wish that were so, but the NK's will go further, and this administration will allow it.

The opportunity that the US has to stop this in it's tracks is rapidly going away. PC seems to dominate even international politics, and We the Peons are gonna pay the price for our chickensh!t leadership.

[geedee]

Sorry, you're right. I probably should've said, "when their fighter harrassed our surveillance aircraft, then hit it."

But my point is the same. China is feeling us out to see what they can get away with. And why not? Pee Wee Clinton gave them some of our latest technology. They had to be laughing their a$$es off.

[Rain-maker]

[PRO 1]

So who is the nimrod that set us up not to be able to handle a 2 (or 3) front war?

[Sabertooth]

I think Bill Clinton is a top level demon, anti Christ type character. With one of his missions being the spread of nuclear weaponry to rouge nations. I know him by his lies and his smile.

For years I told my Lefty friends that I didn't think Bill Clinton was a Communist mole... but that he may as well have been.

[pabianice]

They must be crapping their pants in Japan.

[geedee]

Pee Wee Clinton had other things on his mind . . .

[RightWhale]

Thanks for the map showing my hometown right on the edge of the range and the missile headed our way.

If N Kor attacks, which I think is just a matter of time, Iraq will go on the back burner.

[Dallas]

SEOUL, South Korea -- The U.N. nuclear watchdog said it deplores North Korea's decision to remove U.N. seals and surveillance cameras from nuclear facilities that U.S. officials say could yield weapons within months. Washington and its allies urged Pyongyang to rescind its decision.

North Korea on Monday began removing U.N. seals and "disrupting" cameras at a laboratory used to extract weapons-grade plutonium from spent fuel rods, said the U.N. agency acting as the world's nuclear watchdog.

"There isn't any legitimate purpose for the facility other than separating plutonium from spent fuel," a step in the process of making nuclear weapons, said Mark Gwozdecky, spokesman for the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA.

North Korea indicated Monday the "nuclear issue" could be settled if the United States agrees to a longstanding demand for a nonaggression treaty.

"The U.S. should stop posing a nuclear threat to the DPRK and accept the DPRK's proposal for the conclusion of a nonaggression treaty between the two countries," the North's official newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, said in an editorial. DPRK stands for Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

The United States, which is South Korea's chief ally, says it wants a diplomatic solution, but opposes talks unless North Korea first abandons nuclear weapons development.

North Korea's nuclear ambitions also dominated a previously arranged Monday meeting between South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and successor Roh Moo-hyun, who won last week's election. Roh, who takes office in February, has advocated dialogue to resolve the nuclear problem.

The IAEA, which has been monitoring the facilities, said Pyongyang this weekend unsealed a spent fuel storage chamber that holds 8,000 irradiated fuel rods.

"If they restart them, particularly the reprocessing plant, which will start producing plutonium, then we are in a pretty dangerous situation," Mohamed ElBaradei, the IAEA director-general, said Monday on CNN.

ElBaradei said he has discussed the situation with North Korea's neighbors, the United States and members of the U.N. Security Council.

"Nobody would like to negotiate under a nuclear brinkmanship and that's what's happening right now," he said.

State Department spokesman Lou Fintor said, "The 8000-odd spent fuel rods are of particular concern because they could be reprocessed to recover plutonium for nuclear weapons."

Pyongyang's move Sunday raised fears of a nuclear crisis on the Korean Peninsula similar to one involving the same facilities in 1994. At that time, officials in Seoul and Washington feared a heightened possibility of war with North Korea.

Conflict was averted when North Korea agreed to freeze the facilities in a deal with the United States. But it said Dec. 12 that it planned to reactivate them to produce electricity because Washington had failed to follow through on a pledge to provide energy.

North Korea said the Vienna-based IAEA failed to respond to its request to remove the equipment, compelling it to do so itself.

The IAEA said the seals and surveillance equipment had been removed from the spent fuel pond, which stores the fuel rods, at the 5-megawatt, Soviet-designed reactor in Yongbyon, 50 miles north of Pyongyang.

Fintor said spent fuel rods had "no relevance" for generating electricity. Their unsealing "belies North Korea's announced justification to produce electricity," he said.

Security experts believe North Korea made one or two nuclear weapons using plutonium it extracted from the Yongbyon reactor in the 1990s. Now there are fears it will reprocess plutonium fuel rods that were separated from the Yongbyon reactor, and later stored under supervision by IAEA inspectors.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Monday that diplomatic efforts are under way between North Korea, its neighbors and the United States.

"There are a variety of interactions taking place," Rumsfeld said.

Rumsfeld and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers told a Pentagon news conference Monday that North Korea's claim it needs electricity from the nuclear plants does not hold up to analysis.

"They don't need a nuclear power plant," Rumsfeld said. "They couldn't even absorb that."

Myers said the plant "adds negligible electricity to the power grid."

South Korea, Japan, and France have strongly criticized the North Korean action.

Russian Nuclear Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev confirmed Monday that North Korea started relaunching its nuclear program and also expressed regret over the decision, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported. He also was quoted as saying the U.N. nuclear watchdog "has not given a proper assessment to this fact as yet."

The announcement by the North's state-run news agency, KCNA, that the monitoring equipment was being removed was part of a dispute that has been escalating since October, when U.S. officials said North Korea admitted it had a secret nuclear weapons program based on uranium enrichment.

The program violated several nuclear arms control agreements, and Washington and its allies suspended shipments of heavy fuel oil to the energy-starved country that were required under the 1994 deal. Instead of giving up its nuclear program, Pyongyang said it had no choice but to revive old nuclear facilities that were frozen under the same agreement.

Copyright © 2002, The Associated Press

[MatthewViti]

I've been saying all along that N.K. is a greater threat than Iraq.

[finnman69]

Thank god Bush okayed Missile Defense.

[Dallas]

WASHINGTON, Dec 23 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said on Monday that North Korea would be mistaken if it felt emboldened by Washington's focus on Iraq to pursue its own quest for nuclear weapons.

Asked if North Korea might be seeking to exploit U.S. attention on Iraq to re-start its nuclear weapons program, Rumsfeld said, "If they do, it would be a mistake."

He said the United States was able to wage two regional conflicts at the same time.

"We are capable of winning decisively in one and swiftly defeating in the case of the other," he said at a Pentagon briefing. "Let there be no doubt about it."

North Korea confirmed on Sunday it had begun removing U.N. seals and cameras at the Yongbyon nuclear reactor, which was idled in a watershed deal with the United States eight years ago. It said it did so to generate electricity.

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell on Monday consulted France, Russia and Britain about the situation and said the United States wanted a peaceful resolution, said State Department spokesman Philip Reeker. Over the weekend, Powell discussed the issue with Chinese, South Korean, Russian and Japanese officials among others.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said on Saturday that North Korea had disabled surveillance devices the agency had placed at the Yongbyon reactor. North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency later said seals and monitoring cameras were being removed "from the frozen nuclear facilities for their normal operation to produce electricity."

The IAEA also said North Korea had broken seals on about 8,000 spent fuel rods at Yongbyon which Washington and its allies fear could be used to produce plutonium for weapons. The CIA has previously estimated North Korea had enough plutonium produced before 1992 to make one or two nuclear weapons.

"Everybody is supportive of the IAEA view that North Korea's actions raise serious concerns and certainly belies their announced justification to produce electricity," Reeker said. "Spent fuel rods can be (used) to produce plutonium but they have no relevance to electricity generation."

"They are violating their responsibilities ... and we're not going to respond to threats or broken commitments," Reeker added. "We do want a peaceful resolution."

Unlike its stance on Iraq, which Washington has threatened with war if it fails to give up its suspected weapons of mass destruction programs, the United States has said it wants a peaceful resolution with North Korea since Pyongyang told U.S. officials in October it had a secret nuclear weapons program.

[.38sw]

Why post something like this in breaking news? Aren't Trent Lott and Bill Frist, who is apparently just as racist as Trent, more important? I certainly get that impression from the talking head shows. (Do I need a sarcasm tag here?)

[AmericanInTokyo]

They must be crapping their pants in Japan.

No s__t!

[AmericanInTokyo]

It may be too late for Anchorage, and it is certainly too late for Tokyo/Yokohama (population 14 million).

An INTERNATIONAL strike team composed of countries that could be targets of this in the region, led by the USAF, need to go in and neutralize this before it goes any further. No 10-month U.N. studies on the matter and games of cat and mouse. We know precisely where all of their facilities are due to intel from recent defectors who worked on the programs as well as humint and satellite information.

The only thing that needs to be demonstrated is whether we have the will.

"Axis of Evil" nation? Now is the time to see if our actions match up with our macho words before Congress and the world.

[AmericanInTokyo]

excellent map, R-m

[riri]

The sentiment on this board is that North Korea will use these weapons and soon. Why is that? I know Kim is a diabolical lunatic, but is he that crazy?

Also, I swear I remember reading, a while back, that NK had long range missile capability that could reach most of the continental US as well. Is this true or false?

[ravingnutter]

I think Bill Clinton is a top level demon, anti Christ type character.

Funny...I said the same thing about Jimmy Carter recently, LOL!

[Sparta]

If the war stays conventional, the South Koreans can handle the North with the help of the Americans and some American and Japanese reenforcements from Japan.