South Korea yesterday confirmed the shutdown of North Korea's nuclear power plant, a signal that Pyongyang could be moving to double its supply of weapons-grade plutonium.
"We are treating this matter very seriously," said Kim Sook, head of the North American affairs bureau at the South Korean foreign ministry. "I learned that the halt to operations [at the plant] has been verified through various means," he said in an interview with a local radio station.
North Korea claimed in 2003 that it had reprocessed spent fuel rods from its five-megawatt reactor at the Yongbyon complex, 90km north of the capital Pyongyang.
Experts said reprocessing of the 8,000 rods from the plant produced enough plutonium for six to eight nuclear bombs.
By reprocessing another batch of 8,000 rods, North Korea could produce enough weapons-grade plutonium to allow it to double that number.
Selig Harrison, a US expert who visited Pyongyang earlier this month, said that senior North Korean leaders told him the country would start reprocessing the 8,000 spent fuel rods late this month.
The specialist from the Center for International Policy in Washington said the North Koreans were no longer interested in a step-by-step elimination of their nuclear programs in return for rewards.
Instead they would offer to freeze the production of nuclear bombs only if the US promised not to try to topple the communist regime, Harrison was told.
The controversial reactor at Yongbyon was frozen under a 1994 bilateral deal between the US and North Korea under which North Korea agreed to mothball an earlier nuclear program.
Washington believes that North Korea had already diverted enough bomb-grade plutonium at that time for up to two crude nuclear devices.
The 1994 deal collapsed after Washington accused North Korea in October 2002 of running a separate program based on enriched uranium to produce nuclear weapons.
North Korea raised the stakes by reopening the Yongbyon reactor, kicking out international monitors and claiming it possessed reprocessed spent fuel.
It said it would give up its nuclear weapons drive in return for rewards, but Washington refused to offer incentives.
Six-nation talks involving the two Koreas, China, Russia, the US and Japan aimed at ending the North's nuclear arms ambitions have stalled after three inconclusive rounds.
Harrison said Pyongyang appears to have hardened its position further and is not longer ready to bargain away its nuclear weapons and is only offering a freeze.
The development came as the US reportedly prepared to send Christopher Hill, the new assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, to South Korea, Japan and China for talks on the nuclear standoff.
Last week, his boss, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said North Korea was not the top US foreign policy issue.
The US has been trying to use China's influence to rein in North Korea, and Rice said Pyongyang's recent behavior, including its declaration that it had nuclear weapons, was merely a bid for attention.
"I do think the North Koreans have been, frankly, a little bit disappointed that people are not jumping up and down and running around with their hair on fire because [they] have been making these pronouncements," she said.
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
Packed crowds in India celebrating their cricket team’s victory ended in a deadly stampede on Wednesday, with 11 mainly young fans crushed to death, the local state’s chief minister said. Joyous cricket fans had come out to celebrate and welcome home their heroes, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, after they beat Punjab Kings in a roller-coaster Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket final on Tuesday night. However, the euphoria of the vast crowds in the southern tech city of Bengaluru ended in disaster, with Indian Prime Minister Narendra calling it “absolutely heartrending.” Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said most of the deceased are young, with 11 dead
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
DENIAL: Musk said that the ‘New York Times was lying their ass off,’ after it reported he used so much drugs that he developed bladder problems Elon Musk on Saturday denied a report that he used ketamine and other drugs extensively last year on the US presidential campaign trail. The New York Times on Friday reported that the billionaire adviser to US President Donald Trump used so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that he developed bladder problems. The newspaper said the world’s richest person also took ecstasy and mushrooms, and traveled with a pill box last year, adding that it was not known whether Musk also took drugs while heading the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) after Trump took power in January. In a
RSS