By Jon Fox, Global Security Newswire
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration’s diplomatic stance toward North Korea faced a barrage of criticism yesterday from Democrats preparing to take over leadership of the House International Relations Committee (see GSN, Nov. 15).
Representative Tom Lantos (D-Calif.), who is expected to become committee chairman in January, called for a “bold new approach” to the nuclear standoff.
“It is now abundantly clear to the world that our current policies have failed,” he said before the committee heard testimony from Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns. Lantos called for Christopher Hill, the lead U.S. nuclear negotiator with North Korea, to travel to Pyongyang for direct talks. “The administration's refusal to allow visits by American diplomats to North Korea must end, and it must end now.” Lantos said he will work to keep the North Korean issue on the “front burner” and goaded the Bush administration to “resolve the feuds within its own ranks which have hobbled North Korea policy.” The six-nation talks on North Korea’s nuclear program have been stalled for more than a year, though Pyongyang has signaled its intention to resume negotiations. Diplomats could meet next month, officials have said. Representative Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.) called the current impasse the result of “internal bickering and external dithering” by the administration. On both sides of the committee’s aisle, there was criticism that the United States has relied too heavily on China to apply pressure to North Korea. “It is now time for the administration to stop outsourcing our foreign policy to China and to negotiate directly with the North Koreans,” Ackerman said. Representative Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) echoed the concern, saying chances for a resolution of the situation hinged on U.S. diplomacy. “This administration should not be relying on China to accomplish that end,” he said. Burns noted that U.S. officials have met with representatives of North Korea bilaterally within the context of the negotiations’ regional framework. “From time to time, as you know, in 2005 and 2006 we have met with the North Koreans bilaterally. Chris Hill two weeks ago met with Kim Kye Gwan on a bilateral basis,” Burns said (see GSN, Nov. 1). He described dual paths being pursued as the international community tries to compel North Korea to entirely relinquish its military and civilian nuclear programs. “The first of those tracks is pressure and isolation, and that comes through the U.N. Security Council sanctions and the actions of leading countries like the United States,” he said. “The second of those tracks is to keep the door open to discussions and a return to the six-party talks.” The United States remains committed to the provisions outlined in the September 2005 Joint Statement in which North Korea agreed in principle to denuclearize. The United States agreed to “take steps” to normalize relations with Pyongyang, which would also receive energy aid from the negotiating nations. Pyongyang walked away from its Joint Statement commitments, and as talks resume the United States expects the North Koreans to hew to the letter of that agreement, Burns said. “We’re willing to live up to our commitments, we now need to see North Korea take action to live up to its commitments,” he said. Despite the imposition of U.N. sanctions, Lantos said a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula “may prove elusive.” Without a change in diplomatic strategies, the six-party talks “will once again end in disappointment.” Representative Jim Leach (R-Iowa), who lost his bid for re-election in the midterm Democratic seizure of both houses of Congress, rejected the way Burns framed the debate over the mode of negotiations — multilateral versus purely bilateral. “I believe you set up a bit of a straw-man argument,” he said. “I know of no serious commentator or observer of North Korea that favors solely bilateral discussions, which is the way you phrased it.” Leach and other committee members joined the call for strengthening bilateral talks between Washington and Pyongyang. “I think you’re going to be hearing much of that in the course of the next two years,” Representative Bill Delahunt (D-Mass.) told Burns.
By Jon Fox, Global Security Newswire
WASHINGTON — Iran could produce a nuclear bomb within as little as a year, and its nuclear ambitions are likely to prompt a number of nearby nations to pursue weapons programs of their own, a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency said yesterday (see GSN, Nov. 14). James Woolsey, CIA director during the Clinton administration, offered an urgent assessment of the Iranian nuclear program, suggesting a much shorter timeframe required to produce a nuclear device than that offered by current intelligence officials. Earlier this year, National Intelligence Director John Negroponte said Iran could produce a weapon by 2010 at the earliest and that it could possibly take until 2015. Woolsey is less sanguine. “Within a year or two or three, Iran could have a primitive nuclear weapon,” he said at a discussion held by the American Foreign Policy Council. Such a device would likely not be able to fit on top of a ballistic missile, he said. “The first thing we need to do is stare these facts in the face and not take false comfort that it would take many, many years,” Woolsey said. Both the United States and the United Kingdom have identified Iran’s uranium enrichment program as a component of a clandestine nuclear weapons program, and the U.N. Security Council has formally called on Tehran to halt nuclear activities (see GSN, Sept. 21). Tehran, has refused, claiming its research into centrifuge technology is part of a peaceful energy-production program. The permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany are negotiating details of possible sanctions against Iran (see related GSN story, today). Iran has two pilot enrichment facilities, but U.N. officials say they have produced only small amounts of low-enriched uranium. Concerns, however, stem from the fact that the same machinery used to enrich uranium to the low level required for certain types of nuclear reactors can also enrich the material to the much higher level needed to fuel a nuclear bomb. Woolsey suggested that Iran could be aided in its presumptive nuclear ambitions by a now-nuclear North Korea. North Korea has enough plutonium for several bombs and could sell or transfer some of that material to Iran, he said. While North Korea’s known nuclear program focuses on plutonium as a weapon fuel, U.S. officials say the North Koreans acknowledged a secret uranium enrichment program in 2002. “It doesn’t need to ship it on seagoing vessels that can be searched,” Woolsey said, suggesting that the U.S.-led Proliferation Security Initiative and a U.N. resolution drafted to stop weapons material from leaving North Korea might be ineffective. Fissile material could be packed into a diplomatic pouch, put on a plane and simply flown to Iran, he said. “Would the North Koreans do something like that? Of course they would do something like that,” he said. Iran’s nuclear endeavors could lead to the spread of nuclear weapons among Sunni Muslim-dominated nations concerned about the regional power of a nuclear-armed, Shiite-governed Iran, Woolsey said. He pointed to recent reports that six Arab countries have come forward with intentions to develop nuclear energy programs. Egypt has made its intentions to restart a nuclear energy program clear, and according to the Middle East Economic Digest, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco and Tunisia have also indicated a desire for nuclear programs. Woolsey suggested the programs could be a door to nuclear weapons research and noted that a number of the countries expressing a new nuclear interest are awash in oil. With cheap available energy, their claims that they are seeking nuclear programs for peaceful, civilian purposes could seem disingenuous, Woolsey said. “If you believe that you’ll believe almost anything,” he said. “We may see a move to further proliferation in this … part of the world.” The International Atomic Energy Agency and the international nonproliferation regime are just not designed to prevent countries from progressing from mastery of nuclear fuel cycle technology to harnessing that power for nuclear weapons, Woolsey said. “I think the only way to stop this is to stop the Iranian nuclear program.”
North Korea will suffer “consequences” if it is found to have transferred nuclear technology or weapons to other nations, U.S. President George W. Bush said today (see GSN, Nov. 15). “The transfer of nuclear weapons or material by North Korea to states or nonstate entities would be considered a grave threat to the United States and we would hold North Korea fully accountable for the consequences of such action,” Bush said during a speech at the National University of Singapore. “For the sake of peace, it is vital that the nations of this region send a message to North Korea that the proliferation of nuclear technology to hostile regimes or terrorist networks will not be tolerated.” While he did not identify potential recipients of North Korea nuclear equipment, he was alluding to Iran, the New York Times reported. Bush is traveling through Asia for five days, a trip that will include a stop at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum in Vietnam. He will meet there with other leaders from the nations involved in the six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear program. Bush’s meeting with South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun is likely to be tense, the Times reported. Roh has criticized Washington’s handling of the nuclear standoff. Meanwhile, Seoul has been reluctant to pursue strong sanctions in response to Pyongyang’s Oct. 9 nuclear test and this week refused to join the U.S.-led Proliferation Security Initiative (see GSN, Nov. 14). Roh had suggested that a North Korean nuclear test would “change everything” about Seoul’s relationship with Pyongyang, U.S. officials said. “It seems to have changed almost nothing,” said one senior national security aide. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who is already in Hanoi, said she had no doubt that South Korea is committed to ending North Korea’s nuclear program. “Their context is different,” she said. Both sides in the negotiations must show signs of good faith, Rice said, without offering specifics. U.S. officials said that might include allowing international inspections of nuclear sites or demolishing a nuclear facility. “I do think that after setting off a nuclear test, the North Koreans need to do something to show they’re committed to denuclearization that goes beyond words and just saying they’re committed to denuclearization,” Rice said. “After having set off a nuclear test, I think there’s some skepticism about that.” U.S. officials acknowledged the need for concrete results at the next round of six-nation talks, the Times reported. “The issue is, we really need this round to be successful,” one senior official said. “We can’t emerge saying we set up a working group” (Sanger/Cooper, New York Times, Nov. 16). Rice indicated that Washington might not want to rush back into the talks, which have been suspended for more than a year, Reuters reported. I don’t think it makes sense for us to have talks unless we think that it’s going to be fruitful,” she said (Reuters I/New York Times, Nov. 16). Pacific Rim nations can promote North Korean denuclearization “by putting pressure on North Korea with a combination of carrots and sticks,” Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo said as he met with his counterparts on the sidelines of the APEC meeting, the Associated Press reported. “The nuclear test has meant that we have turned a new chapter,” he said. “There’s no going back. As one minister said, the egg cannot be unscrambled. Pressure must be put on the North Koreans. It must be made crystal clear to them that what they are doing is not acceptable” (Bo-Mi Lim, Associated Press I, Nov. 16). North Korean officials, in recent meetings in Pyongyang with visiting U.S. experts, indicated that “we’re going to be a tougher negotiating partner now that we have demonstrated our nuclear capacity,” said Stanford University nuclear scientist Siegfried Hecker. Officials expressed their commitment to the September 2005 agreement in which Pyongyang pledged in principle to give up its nuclear weapons program, said Charles Pritchard, former lead U.S. negotiator with North Korea. However, they “placed a great deal of emphasis on what the United States and others are required to do,” he said. The five negotiating nations have offered energy support and diplomatic recognition in exchange for North Korea’s nuclear disarmament. “They’re not in this to give up their nuclear weapons. They’re in it for their own mutual benefit,” Pritchard said at a news conference in Washington. Prior to the nuclear test, North Korea had enough separated plutonium for between six and eight weapons, according to Hecker. The Yongbyon reactor could produce material for one bomb annually, he said (Reuters II/Yahoo!News, Nov. 15). Meanwhile, France today was inspecting a North Korean ship that stopped at an island between Africa and Madagascar, AP reported. The U.N. Security Council resolution approved in the wake of the nuclear test called for inspections of ships going in and out of the Stalinist state. “The customs administration is currently proceeding with a complete and thorough inspection of merchandise and personnel on a North Korean ship on a stopover in [the French-administered island of] Mayotte,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Jean-Baptiste Mattei. It was not known if other nations have already conducted such examinations, AP reported (Associated Press II/New York Times, Nov. 16).
The U.S. Senate yesterday began formal consideration of legislation enabling the U.S.-Indian nuclear trade deal, and one key senator urged his colleagues to back the agreement, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, Nov. 15). “This pact is a lasting incentive for India to abstain from further nuclear weapons tests and to cooperate closely with the United States in stopping proliferation,” said Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Richard Lugar (R-Ind.). “This agreement is the most important strategic diplomatic initiative undertaken by President [George W.] Bush.” Lugar encouraged his fellow senators to pass the legislation “without conditions that would kill the agreement.” The U.S. House of Representatives passed its version of the enabling legislation in July, and Senate leaders from both parties have expressed their desire to pass the Senate version before the end of the year. Still, it remains uncertain whether the bill will reach the Senate floor for a full vote before the end of this year’s lame-duck session, according to AFP (Agence France-Presse/Yahoo!News, Nov. 16).
Another New York meeting of U.N. powers yesterday failed to make progress toward agreeing on a Security Council resolution to pressure Iran to suspend its nuclear activities, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Nov. 13). Ambassadors from Germany and the five permanent council members — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States — met to find common ground between two proposed draft resolutions. A European-crafted version calls for imposing trade and travel bans against Iran, while a Russian version contains fewer restrictions, AP reported. The diplomats are seeking to respond to Iran’s refusal this summer to heed the council’s demand to freeze its uranium enrichment program. While they did not agree in the meeting, the U.S. and Russian ambassadors concurred on the lack of progress. “We didn’t make any progress today, let’s leave it at that,” said U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton. “There are wide gaps in the items that would be covered under the two alternative proposals.” His Russian counterpart, Vitaly Churkin, said “a rather intense exchange of opinion” failed to narrow those gaps (Edith Lederer, Associated Press/International Herald Tribune, Nov. 16). One senior White House official urged observers not to be discouraged by the impasse. “Look, we have these struggles on these resolutions all the time and they result in a lot of press stories about ‘disarray in the international communities,’ but I would remind you that over the last few years, when the time has come the international community has pulled together,” said national security adviser Stephen Hadley. “You know, it’s a little bit like sausage-making. It’s not pretty and a lot of it spills out to the public, but I think the international community has held together on this issue and I think it will again,” he added. Hadley spoke to reporters in Moscow, where U.S. President George W. Bush made a 90-minute stopover on his way to a summit of Asian-Pacific leaders in Vietnam. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin “talked a little bit about proliferation generally,” Hadley said, and a Kremlin statement reported the presidents discussed the Iranian nuclear crisis and other nonproliferation concerns (Jennifer Loven, Associated Press II/San Diego Union-Tribune, Nov. 16). Meanwhile, a U.N. commission responsible for monitoring the U.N. arms embargo on Somalia has concluded that Iran is violating the ban in exchange for access to Somali uranium, AP reported today. The leaked report says 10 African and Middle Eastern nations are breaking the embargo. “At the time of the writing of the present report, there were two Iranians in Dhusa Mareb engaged in matters linked to uranium in exchange for arms,” the report says (Chris Tomlinson, Associated Press III/International Herald Tribune, Nov. 16). Somalia has about 6,600 metric tons of uranium deposits, the London Telegraph reported today. That amount is very small compared to other African nations, but the anarchy that has befallen the country over the past 15 years has left Islamic leaders in charge of the area of the nation with the uranium, according to the Telegraph (David Blair, The Telegraph, Nov. 16). Some observers cautioned against accepting the view of the U.N. report. “There is a lot of misinformation flowing around Somalia right now, so we must be very skeptical,” said one diplomat who follows the nation closely (Tomlinson, Associated Press III). In Tehran, Iranian officials dismissed as old news a report this week from the International Atomic Energy Agency that highlighted concerns over traces of highly enriched uranium and plutonium that agency inspectors found at an Iranian waste site (see GSN, Nov. 14). “This is an old story and contains no new points,” said Alaeddin Boroujerdi, head of the nation’s parliamentary commission on national security and foreign policy. “Iran has submitted a comprehensive report on the issue to the IAEA. It will be convincing.” The report acknowledges that Iran has submitted explanations for the finding, but states that more information is required. Still, Iran’s insistence that the uranium and plutonium traces are innocent could be plausible, said a U.N. official. The traces of highly enriched uranium were not weapon-grade material, the official said, and the materials could have been produced as byproducts of peaceful nuclear work (Nasser Karimi, Associated Press IV/Forbes.com, Nov. 16).
Saudi Arabia is conducting nuclear technology experiments that have nothing to do with weapons, the country’s ambassador to Kuwait said in remarks published yesterday, though he apparently misunderstood the purpose of the research (see GSN, April 19). “The kingdom is not seeking to possess nuclear weapons,” Ambassador Abdul-Aziz al-Fayez told the Al-Qabas daily in Kuwait. Experiments at the King Abdul-Aziz City for Science and Technology in Riyadh involve “the field of nuclear energy,” he said, according to the Associated Press. However, the facility said in a prepared statement that the ambassador had “misinterpreted the actual activities” being conducted. Rather than seeking to produce energy, the research involves the use of nuclear techniques in sectors such as agriculture, health, cancer therapy and the medical field, according to the statement (Associated Press/International Herald Tribune, Nov. 15).
Computer giant IBM and the U.S. Energy Department plan to jointly advance U.S. supercomputing technology in a five-year program, the department announced yesterday (see GSN, Sept. 7). Under the $58 million project, the department’s National Nuclear Security Administration will share with IBM the costs of improving the capability of U.S. computers that model nuclear weapons. “Supercomputers are crucial to the continued success of the NNSA’s science-based efforts to keep the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile safe, secure and reliable without underground testing,” said NNSA chief Linton Brooks in a press statement. The enhanced computing power could also be used for peaceful purposes, such as genome sequencing, climate change modeling and improving nuclear power technology, according to an IBM release. “Computing at these scales will enable predictive simulations that allow researchers to understand how complex physical, chemical and biological systems behave over time,” Brooks said in the release. “Previously, it was only possible to get brief snapshots on a smaller scale” (IBM release, Nov. 15).
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