North Korea reactor shut-down problematic, US says
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-04-29 18:23

SEOUL - The United States believes North Korea may be trying to harvest material for a nuclear bomb from a shut-down reactor, the chief U.S. negotiator to stalled nuclear talks said on Friday, adding that this would be "problematic."

"The plutonium reactor at Yongbyon has not been running going on three weeks," said Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill. "There could be an effort to reprocess (nuclear material)."

Hill told reporters after meeting South Korean officials that the reactor shutdown and the possibility of a North Korean nuclear test were of great concern to powers trying through six-way talks to coax Pyongyang into giving up its atomic programs.

"To go ahead and have a nuclear test at a time the six-party talks are in abeyance I think would be very troubling for the talks," Hill said.

"Efforts to harvest plutonium at a time the North Korean side is simply boycotting the talks would also be very problematic for the talks," he said.

Patience in Washington on the nuclear issue is wearing thin, but Hill told a news conference: "We are not abandoning the six-party process."

Proliferation experts say the North may have already harvested enough fissile material to produce six to eight plutonium bombs.

Earlier this month, U.S. newspapers reported that North Korea had stepped up activity at a site Washington believes can be used for an underground atomic test.

WEIGHING OPTIONS

In Washington on Thursday, the head of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency told a Senate committee that North Korea had the ability to mount a nuclear device on a long-range missile and that the communist state could hit U.S. territory.

The agency itself played down the statement, however.

President Bush, asked about it at a White House news conference, said only: "There is concern about his capability to deliver a nuclear weapon. We don't know if he can or not but I think it's best, when you're dealing with a tyrant like Kim Jong-il, to assume he can."

The last round of the six-party nuclear discussions -- which bring together the two Koreas, Japan, China, Russia and the United States -- took place in June 2004.

In February, North Korea declared it now possessed nuclear weapons and was withdrawing from the talks.

A senior South Korean government official said, however, that North Korea might also be looking for a resolution.

"We still think they are weighing their options. I don't think they have given up on the goal of trying to resolve this through diplomacy," said the official, who asked not to be named.

Hill has been on a whirlwind trip to speak with leaders in China, Japan and South Korea about finding a way to bring North Korea back to the bargaining table.

"The mood, as we discuss the progress of these talks, is not very good right now," Hill said.

The United States has acknowledged it might consider tougher action against North Korea if it refuses to return, such as taking the matter to the U.N. Security Council.

Another option for the Bush administration would be to seek a U.N. resolution empowering nations to intercept ships and aircraft that may be carrying nuclear-related material in and out of North Korea.

The ball was in Pyongyang's court, Hill said.

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