North Korea may have enough weapons-grade plutonium to make up to six nuclear bombs, the head of the UN atomic watchdog agency said in another warning about the reclusive regime's secretive nuclear program.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei told Cable News Network on Sunday evening that Pyongyang has the nuclear infrastructure to convert the material into atomic weapons.
"We knew they had the plutonium that could be converted into five or six North Korea weapons," ElBaradei told CNN.
Recent satellite imagery suggests North Korea may be preparing to test a weapon underground, and the IAEA has been urging the international community to increase pressure on Pyongyang to refrain from any such test.
IAEA inspectors were expelled from North Korea in 2002, and the agency has stressed that there is no way to know for sure whether the country is close to producing a nuclear weapon or is getting ready to test one.
Agency spokesman Mark Gwozdecky said yesterday that estimates of the amount of nuclear material North Korea holds were based on pre-expulsion inspections of the country's 5-megawatt reactor at Yongbyon.
"When our inspectors were there, they were monitoring the freeze at the Yongbyon facility and in particular the 8,000 spent fuel rods that were stored there," he said. "We can estimate the amount of plutonium they could contain."
ElBaradei described the latest developments as a "cry for help" on Pyongyang's part.
"North Korea, I think, has been seeking a dialogue with the United States, with the rest of the international community ... through their usual policy of nuclear blackmail, nuclear brinkmanship, to force the other parties to engage them," he said.
"We know that they had the industrial infrastructure to weaponize this plutonium. We have read also that they have the delivery system," ElBaradei told CNN. "I do hope that the North Koreans would absolutely reconsider such a reckless, reckless step."
Last month, diplomats told reporters that the US was warning its allies that North Korea may be ready to carry out a nuclear test as early as June, basing the assessment in part on satellite photographs that suggested it was digging an underground test site.
The reported US warnings reflected growing fears in Washington that the North is going ahead with efforts to develop nuclear weapons after South Korean officials said Pyongyang had recently shut down a reactor, possibly to harvest plutonium that could be used in an underground test.
The Yongbyon reactor generated spent fuel rods laced with plutonium, but they must be removed and reprocessed to extract the plutonium for use in an atomic weapon. They can be removed only if the reactor has been shut down.
The US intelligence community believes North Korea has one or more nuclear weapons, and has untested two- and three-stage missiles capable of reaching US soil. But it has been unclear whether Pyongyang has yet developed the technology to miniaturize a nuclear weapon so it fits on a missile.
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
NEW GEAR: On top of the new Tien Kung IV air defense missiles, the military is expected to place orders for a new combat vehicle next year for delivery in 2028 Mass production of Tien Kung IV (Sky Bow IV) missiles is expected to start next year, with plans to order 122 pods, the Ministry of National Defense’s (MND) latest list of regulated military material showed. The document said that the armed forces would obtain 46 pods of the air defense missiles next year and 76 pods the year after that. The Tien Kung IV is designed to intercept cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to an altitude of 70km, compared with the 60km maximum altitude achieved by the Missile Segment Enhancement variant of PAC-3 systems. A defense source said yesterday that the number of
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole
Taiwanese exports to the US are to be subject to a 20 percent tariff starting on Thursday next week, according to an executive order signed by US President Donald Trump yesterday. The 20 percent levy was the same as the tariffs imposed on Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh by Trump. It was higher than the tariffs imposed on Japan, South Korea and the EU (15 percent), as well as those on the Philippines (19 percent). A Taiwan official with knowledge of the matter said it is a "phased" tariff rate, and negotiations would continue. "Once negotiations conclude, Taiwan will obtain a better
RSS