South Korea is proposing to use North Korean nuclear fuel rods, to be removed from a reactor under a six-nation disarmament deal, for South Korean power plants, a news report said yesterday.
Seoul's Yonhap news agency quoted an unnamed government source as saying negotiators should decide how to dispose of the nuclear fuel that will be removed as part of the full dismantling of the North's nuclear facilities under the deal.
"Bringing the North Korean fuel rods into the South is one of the options now under consideration," the government source was quoted as saying, adding that Seoul first needs to make sure that the North's fuel can be used by the South's nuclear power plants.
ELECTRICITY SUPPLY
Twenty nuclear power plants are operating in South Korea, meeting about 40 percent of the country's need for electricity, government data show.
But the source did not clarify Seoul's position on what to do with weapons-grade plutonium -- a key source for making atomic bombs -- that the North has supposedly extracted from the spent fuel rods.
Seoul's top nuclear envoy Chun Yung-woo said on Friday that the US-led disabling of North Korea's nuclear site was proceeding smoothly, with thousands of spent fuel rods expected to be relocated from a five-megawatt reactor to a cooling pond starting next year.
"Most of the disabling work, except for the removal of the nuclear fuel rods from the reactor, is expected to be completed this year," Chun said. "A lot of preparation is needed to take the fuel rods out."
The North staged a nuclear test in October last year despite international warnings, but agreed in February to a disarmament deal under the landmark six-nation nuclear talks.
Under the accord endorsed by the two Koreas, China, the US, Russia and Japan, the North began disabling three of its main nuclear facilities at Yongbyon under supervision by US inspectors last month.
DISARMAMENT DEAL
As part of the deal, the North should disable the Yongbyon plants and declare a full list of its nuclear program by year-end in return for 1 million tonnes of oil or equivalent energy aid.
If the North keeps up its end of the deal, the US has agreed to move towards removing the country from its list of state sponsors of terrorism and to normalize diplomatic ties.
North Korea said on Friday it would keep its commitment to disabling the plants by year-end as long as its partners kept their promises.
Top US nuclear negotiator Christopher Hill said on Friday in Seoul that he hoped North Korea would be nuclear-free by next year, but added that the country must give up all its atomic material.
Hill plans today to fly to North Korea to inspect work under way at its Yongbyon complex to disable three plutonium-producing nuclear plants.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS