SOUTH KOREA: South Korea has admitted that government scientists enriched uranium four years ago to a level that several Vienna diplomats said was almost pure enough for an atomic bomb, the UN nuclear watchdog said yesterday.
Although only a minute quantity of uranium was involved, two Western diplomats close to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said the enrichment was below but "very close" to the threshold for bomb-grade uranium. "It was well beyond the level that would be needed for a civilian programme," one diplomat said.
"The government says that its programme is peaceful, and the IAEA is not making any judgments on that issue."
South Korea said in a statement that the experiments were carried out by a group of scientists without government knowledge, and soon ended. "This is enrichment of uranium," a government official said.
Other officials had earlier said the experiments did not go as far as enriching uranium.
The IAEA said Seoul had told the agency that "these activities were carried out without the government's knowledge at a nuclear site in Korea in 2000".
At the same time, a Vienna diplomat said the scientists were government employees working at a government-run facility.
Mr David Albright, a former UN weapons inspector and currently president of the Institute for Science and International Security, said this could indicate Seoul has not fully abandoned its atomic weapons capability.