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From correspondents in Seoul October 01, 2008 02:06pm
Article from: Agence France-Presse INCREASED activity has been spotted near the site of North Korea's 2006
nuclear test but it is unclear whether the hardline communist country is
preparing for a second test, a report said.
Smoke was spotted recently at various places around the site in the
country's northeast, a South Korean government source was quoted by
Yonhap news agency as saying. "We are closely watching to determine whether North Korea is working to
repair the nuclear site," the source said, adding the smoke is believed
to have come from the burning of clothes and equipment used during the
repair work. Other sources quoted by Yonhap said the North may be simulating activity
to pressure the United States amid a deadlocked nuclear disarmament
deal. They said the North is believed to have finished repairing the
site after its first test on October 9, 2006. South Korea's intelligence agency said it could not confirm the activity
at the site at Punggye-ri in Gilju country of North Hamkyong province. The report came as US nuclear envoy Christopher Hill arrived in the
North to try to salvage the crumbling disarmament deal. North Korea's first underground nuclear test sparked international alarm
and United Nations sanctions. But weeks later the North rejoined
disarmament talks. Those negotiations are now falling apart because the North refuses to
accept US-led demands for thorough inspections of its nuclear facilities. The North last week announced it would begin restarting its plutonium
reprocessing plant at Yongbyon, located 100 kilometres north of Pyongyang. It shut down Yongbyon in July 2007 and began disabling it in November.
In return, Pyongyang was to receive one million tons of fuel oil or
equivalent energy aid and Washington was to remove it from the terror
blacklist. However, Washington refuses to act on the delisting until the North
accepts the procedures for outside verification of a nuclear declaration
which it submitted in June.
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