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Nuclear reactors in North Korea
Mike Thomson.
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North Korea's director of energy, Kim Jae-rok has revealed plans to build four more nuclear plants, each bigger and more powerful than the controversial Yongbyon plant.
America fears that this may be used to develop nuclear weapons. However Mr Jae-rok claimed that "desperate measures" were called for because much of North Korea was without heat or lighting. He insisted that North Korea was not producing nuclear weapons in its present facilities and would not use the planned new plants to do so.
Tension between North Korea and the West began to escalate last October when Washington claimed Pyongyang had admitted to pursuing a secret programme of uraniam enrichment, breaching the 1994 agreement in which North Korea would terminate the development of all nuclear weapons.
In December, the UN confirmed that North Korea had begun shipping fuel rods to the Yongbyon reactor, which could be used to produce plutonium. At the same time, Pyongyang expelled two IAEA inspectors, saying it planned to re-open a reprocessing plant that could turn spent rods into weapons-grade plutonium within months.
The IAEA has referred the situation to the UN Security Council. The Council are currently considering North Korea's breach of nuclear safeguards, and have the power to impose economic or political sanctions against North Korea, which Pyongyang has previously said it would consider tantamount to a declaration of war.
The North Korean government are banking on the fact any further sanctions are opposed by the European Union and many of North Korea's neighbours, including China, Japan and South Korea. They believe that diplomacy rather than confrontation is the way forward, a view shared by Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the IAEA.
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Rare sight of a US cadillac in the streets North Korea
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Sacks of grain at the World Food Programme
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Apartments where locals live
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The tense border where North Korean and US soldiers stand eyeball to eyeball.
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