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N Korea destroys cooling tower at Yongbyon reactor

North Korea destroyed the most visible symbol of its nuclear weapons program yesterday, blasting apart the cooling tower at an atomic reactor in a sign of its commitment to stop making plutonium for atomic bombs.

The demolition of the 20m-tall cooling tower at the North’s main reactor complex was a response to US concessions after the North delivered a declaration on Thursday of its nuclear programs to be dismantled.

A single blast at the base of the cylindrical structure sent the tower collapsing into a cloud of smoke as international journalists and diplomats looked on, according to video footage filmed by broadcaster APTN at the site.

Those at the event later pored over the shattered pieces of the tower.

“This is a very important step in the disablement process and I think it puts us in a good position to move into the next phase,” said Sung Kim, the US State Department’s senior expert on the Koreas, who attended the demolition.

Kim shook hands with North Korean officials following the tower’s tumble to the ground.

The symbolic explosion came just 20 months after Pyongyang shocked the world by detonating a nuclear bomb in an underground test to confirm its status as an atomic power. The nuclear blast spurred an about-face in the US hardline policy against Pyongyang, leading to the North’s first steps to scale back its nuclear weapons development since the reactor became operational in 1986.

Last year, the North switched off the reactor at Yongbyon and it has already begun disabling the facility under the watch of US experts.

The destruction of the cooling tower, which carries off waste heat to the atmosphere, is another step forward but not the most technically significant because it is a simple piece of equipment that would be easy to rebuild.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the tower’s destruction would mark a step toward disablement to prevent the North from making more plutonium for bombs.

The declaration was being distributed yesterday by China, the chair of the arms talks, to the other countries involved.
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