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/begin my translation Exclusive: One of Missiles N. Korea Test-fired is SS-22Its range is extended to 1,000 km, and can carry 500 kg nuclear warhead2006-07-10 04:18:47   Of six missiles N. Korea launched on July 5th, which are suspected to be Nodong and Scud missiles, one could be N. Korean version of SS-22 medium range missile(s.) A high-level N. Korean defector I met told me about what Japanese Defense Agency suspects to be 'new type of Scud' as follows: "N. Korean military prefer Scud to Nodong. Nodong requires a lot of time for injecting (liquid) fuel and charge, making easy to be detected. Starting...

U.S. Author Sees Kim Jong-il Gone in Five Years A U.S. global security pundit says the U.S. can mobilize the help of South Korea, China and Japan to get rid of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il within five years if it wants to. Thomas Barnett, the author of the widely discussed "The Pentagon's New Map" on Washington’s future military strategy released in 2004, makes the suggestion in his follow-up "Blueprint for Action: A Future Worth Creating" published last month. An expert on the former Soviet Union and a former professor at the U.S. Naval Academy, Barnett briefly served as a...

ISTANBUL, Turkey -- Two government ministers in the Netherlands acknowledged Monday that highly sensitive nuclear technology developed by a Dutch company may have been transferred to Libya and North Korea along with Iran and Pakistan. The disclosure in Parliament in Amsterdam marked the first public confirmation of assertions that centrifuge technology for enriching uranium apparently found its way to Libya and North Korea. It was already known that Pakistan and Iran had the technology. The Dutch officials, Foreign Minister Bernard Bot and Economic Affairs Minister Laurens-Jan Brinkhorst, said it was not clear how the potentially arms-related technology had been transferred....

SEOUL (AFP) - North Korea (news - web sites) has blasted US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, calling him a "stupid" proponent of neo-conservatism for tarnishing the image of the communist country and predicting its collapse. "Rumsfeld whose political faith is to establish the US-style world order by strength is known to be a typical stupid man for professing neo-conservatism censured and mocked at worldwide," North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said late Saturday. The angry remarks came after Rumsfeld reportedly told US and South Korean business leaders last week that he had a night-time satellite picture of the...