U.S. intelligence believes North Korea
making more nuclear bomb fuel despite talks: NBC
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[June 30, 2018]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S.
intelligence agencies believe North Korea has increased production of
fuel for nuclear weapons at multiple secret sites in recent months and
may try to hide these while seeking concessions in nuclear talks with
the United States, NBC News quoted U.S. officials as saying.
In a report on Friday, the network said what it described as the latest
U.S. intelligence assessment appeared to go counter to sentiments
expressed by President Donald Trump, who tweeted after an unprecedented
June 12 summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un that "there is no
longer a nuclear threat from North Korea."
NBC quoted five unidentified U.S. officials as saying that in recent
months North Korea had stepped up production of enriched uranium for
nuclear weapons, even as it engaged in diplomacy with the United States.
The network cited U.S. officials as saying that the intelligence
assessment concludes that North Korea has more than one secret nuclear
site in addition to its known nuclear fuel production facility at
Yongbyon.
"There is absolutely unequivocal evidence that they are trying to
deceive the U.S.," NBC quoted one official as saying.
The CIA declined to comment on the NBC report. The State Department said
it could not confirm it and did not comment on matters of intelligence.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
The NBC report raises further questions about North Korea's readiness to
enter serious negotiations about giving up a weapons program that now
threatens the United States, in spite of Trump's enthusiastic portrayal
of the summit outcome.
NBC quoted one senior U.S. intelligence official as saying that North
Korea's decision ahead of the summit to suspend nuclear and missile
tests was unexpected and the fact that the two sides were talking was a
positive step.
However, he added: "Work is ongoing to deceive us on the number of
facilities, the number of weapons, the number of missiles ... We are
watching closely."
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at
California's Middlebury Institute of International Studies, said there
were two "bombshells" in the NBC report.
He said it had long been understood that North Korea had at least one
undeclared facility to enrich nuclear fuel aside from Yongbyon.
"This assessment says there is more than one secret site. That means
there are at least three, if not more sites," he said.Lewis said the
report also implied that U.S. intelligence had reporting to suggest
North Korea did not intend to disclose one or more of the enrichment
sites.
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North Korea leader Kim Jong Un inspects Unit 1524 of the Korean
People's Army (KPA) in this undated photo released by North Korea's
Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) June 30, 2018. KCNA/via Reuters
"Together, these two things would imply that North Korea intended to
disclose some sites as part of the denuclearization process, while
retaining others," he said.
North Korea agreed at the summit to "work toward denuclearization of
the Korean Peninsula," but the joint statement signed by Kim and
Trump gave no details on how or when Pyongyang might surrender its
nuclear weapons.
Ahead of the summit, North Korea rejected unilaterally abandoning an
arsenal it has called an essential deterrent against U.S.
aggression.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said last week he would likely
go back to North Korea before long to try to flesh out commitments
made at the Trump-Kim meeting.
On Thursday, the Financial Times quoted U.S. officials as saying
that Pompeo plans to travel to North Korea next week, but the State
Department has declined to confirm this.
Bruce Klingner, a former CIA Korea expert now at the conservative
Heritage Foundation think tank, said the NBC report showed Trump's
statement that North Korea was no longer a nuclear threat was
"absurd" and that detailed work on a verification regime was
required.
Trump said last week North Korea was blowing up four of its big test
sites and that a process of "total denuclearization ... has already
started," but officials said there had been no such evidence since
the summit.
This week, Washington-based North Korean monitoring project 38 North
said recent satellite imagery showed North Korea had made rapid
improvements to facilities at Yongbyon since May 6, but it could not
say if such work had continued after June 12.
(Reporting by David Brunnstrom)
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