North Korea is forging ahead with work to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons, which could add to its atomic arsenal and raise the risk it will sell nuclear know-how abroad, a study said Friday.
North Korea
is
forging ahead with work to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons, which could add
to its atomic arsenal and raise the risk it will sell nuclear know-how abroad,
a study said Friday.
The report published by the Institute for Science and International Security,
or ISIS, came after warnings from South Korea that "North Korea's nuclear
threat has progressed at a rapid pace and reached a very alarming level."
South Korea
also
said this week that the North is restoring facilities at its Yongbyon nuclear
reactor, the source of weapons-grade plutonium in the past.
In the report titled "Taking Stock:
North
Korea
's Uranium Enrichment
Program," authors David Albright and Paul Brannan wrote that
North
Korea
is developing centrifuges to
enrich uranium.
The program is an "avenue for
North
Korea
to increase the number and
sophistication of its nuclear weapons and for it to proliferate to others who
seek to build their own centrifuge programs," the authors wrote.
The
ISIS
report, based on procurement data obtained by
governments and information from
Pakistan
, said
the uranium program's status and location of the plants was unclear.
There was enough information to support "that
North
Korea
has moved beyond
laboratory-scale work and has the capability to build, at the very least, a
pilot-scale gas centrifuge plant," the authors added.
But the report said the procurements do not suggest that
Pyongyang
is
able to build a plant with 3,000 centrifuges, which are needed to produce
enough enriched uranium for about two nuclear bombs a year.
"The most effective way to end the threats posed by
North
Korea
's centrifuge program is
through negotiations, even though that route looks currently difficult,"
the report said.
Six-party talks involving North and South Korea, China, Japan, Russia and the
U.S. had previously secured North Korean pledges to give up its nuclear
programs, but Pyongyang stormed out in April 2009.
In the meantime, the report said, Washington and its partners must tighten
existing United Nations sanctions to slow down
North
Korea
's centrifuge program and make
sure
Pyongyang
does
not sell centrifuge, reactor or other nuclear technology.
While saying
China
has
acted in support of UN sanctions against
North
Korea
, the authors said
Beijing
"is not applying enough resources to detect and stop
North
Korea
's nuclear trade."
The report said
North Korea
obtains nuclear technology for its uranium enrichment program by either buying
directly from
China
or
using it as a transhipment point.
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