Missing Pakistani nuclear
scientists may be staying in North Korea helping develop
its uranium-based nuclear weapons programme, reports said
on Sunday.
Yonhap news agency, citing a report from
the state-run Korea Institute for National Unification
(KINU) in Seoul, said North Korea might have achieved
a higher level of technology for enriched uranium with
the help of foreign scientists.
“Nine Pakistani nuclear scientists
have been missing since they left their country six years
ago and we cannot rule out the possibility that some of
them are in North Korea,” KINU researcher Jeon Sung-Hun
was quoted as saying.
North Korea’s highly enriched uranium
programme was at an early stage in its development, he
said. “However, we should be prepared to find that
North Korea has received a level of technology and cooperation
from Pakistan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus
which surpasses general expectations,” he added.
The nuclear standoff on the Korean peninsula
flared in October 2002 when Washington accused North Korea
of running a secret nuclear programme based on enriched
uranium.
North Korea has acknowledged having a
plutonium programme but denies that it is enriching uranium
to make nuclear fuel. It has rejected US demands for a
complete dismantling of its nuclear programmes without
receiving rewards first
