New | North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear facility may be idle again
Yongbyon facility that can yield plutonium was only recently restarted
North Korea may have shut down a recently restarted reactor that can yield plutonium for bombs, possibly for renovation or partial refuelling, a US security institute said, citing new satellite imagery.
North Korea announced in April last year that it would revive its aged 5-megawatt research reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear complex, saying it was seeking a deterrent capacity.
The isolated country, which quit the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty two decades ago, defends its nuclear-arms programme as a "treasured sword" to counter what it sees as US-led hostility.
On Thursday, So Se-pyong, North Korea's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, said Pyongyang was ready to resume the so-called six-party talks and was not planning a nuclear or missile test.
The US responded that Pyongyang must first take meaningful steps towards denuclearisation and refrain from provocative acts.
In line with this view, the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) said commercially available satellite imagery from September 2013 until June this year had shown it was operating.
However, in imagery from late August and late September "both these signatures are missing", it said on its website.
"For this reason, ISIS assesses that it is possible that the reactor is partially or completely shut down," it said.
North Korea may be carrying out a partial refuelling of the reactor's core or it may have shut it down for maintenance or renovation purposes, it said.
"The question of refuelling requires closer scrutiny, because the plutonium would be expected, after separation … to be assigned to nuclear weapons," the institute said.
The Yongbyon reactor had been technically out of operation for years.
North Korea destroyed its cooling tower in 2008 as a confidence-building step in negotiations with South Korea, China, the United States, Japan and Russia, the other five nations in the six-party talks.
When North Korea said it planned to revive it, experts said it would probably take about six months to get it up and running, if it had not suffered significant damage from neglect.
South Korea insists Pyongyang denuclearise for the two sides to come closer together, but few believe the North will ever surrender the ultimate weapon because it provides security for both the country and the government itself.
'Lamentable' response reported by UN to its appeal for North Korea aid
More money is needed to tackle issues in North Korea from stunting in children to chronic malnutrition so that the country's aid programme is not languishing as one of the world's most underfunded, the UN said.
So far, a "modest" appeal of US$116 million for aid for North Korea has gone largely unmet. A "lamentably low" US$26.6 million has been funded, John Ging, director of UN humanitarian operations, said.
"The challenges that are faced in DPRK by the people there are silent in that they are quite underreported in that global context and we cannot ignore or forget our responsibilities there," Ging said, adding that 16 million people suffer chronic food supply insecurity.
He was referring to the country by its official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
Although South Korea recently announced that it would give US$13.3 million to UN agencies to carry out their work, Ging remains concerned about the funding shortage and is alarmed by a dramatic fall-off from the US$350 million donated in 2001.
"The most pressing issue is for children, with 30 per cent of the children in the country stunted; that is the most pressing humanitarian issue and that is about the future for this country," he noted.
