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North Korea Prompts U.S. to Investigate Nuclear Boast
WASHINGTON, April 30 â White House officials have ordered the nation's intelligence agencies to conduct a review of whether North Korea could produce bomb-grade plutonium â as it says it has done â without detection by the United States, according to senior administration officials. The order to the Central Intelligence Agency and other agencies that have long monitored North Korea's nuclear program was prompted by the blunt and direct nature of the North's declaration last week, during negotiations in Beijing, that it was already a nuclear power. It said it had completed reprocessing of 8,000 spent nuclear fuel rods that could provide enough plutonium for four to six additional weapons. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell described the North Korean assertion in testimony today to a Senate subcommittee, saying, "The North Koreans, in very typical bellicose fashion, accused us of everything imaginable and then said, `We reprocessed all the fuel rods that were in storage.' " So far the United States has not been able to verify North Korea's claim to have produced weapons-grade plutonium. "We can't establish that as a matter of fact with our intelligence community, but they said they did it," Mr. Powell said. Until last week, North Korea had never boasted about its nuclear weapons capability, insisting it was only interested in producing electric power from nuclear reactors. The change in tactics, the administration's Korea experts believe, may be an effort to raise the price of dismantling its program, if President Bush reversed himself and was willing to strike a deal to disarm the country. "We think they are bluffing," a senior administration official said. "But we felt the necessity to go back and review every possibility, in the off chance that we missed something." The C.I.A. has long believed that North Korea may have two nuclear weapons developed in the late 1980's or early 1990's, before a 1994 nuclear freeze accord was signed with President Bill Clinton. But the agency is worried about reprocessing, because North Korea could sell plutonium on the open market â a threat Mr. Powell said today that the North Koreans made explicit last week, saying their decision "depends on the American reaction." The chemical process of reprocessing spent fuel into plutonium lets off a distinct signature â a form of krypton â that can be detected by sensors used by American intelligence agencies for decades, back to the days of the cold war. So far there has been no evidence of that gas, officials say, or other evidence that reprocessing has begun. But some senior administration officials have long been concerned that the intelligence agencies have missed either a hidden reprocessing plant or one that operates at such a low level that it would not emit a detectable signature. "I've never been satisfied that we knew everything we should about the nature of their program," one senior administration official said. (con't see link) Posted by: Anonymous 2003-05-01 |
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