China Says South Korean Nuclear Experiments Should be Topic of Six-Party Talks on North Korea

South Korea’s recently revealed nuclear experiments should be discussed at the next round of multilateral talks on North Korea’s nuclear program, China said yesterday (see GSN, Sept. 16).

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan said the South Korean experiments, which involved small amounts of enriched uranium and plutonium, should be discussed at talks involving China, Japan, North Korea, Russia, South Korea and the United States.

South Korea, however, has rejected such an idea, a senior official said today.

“These experiments have no relevance to the six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear program,” said Chung Woo-seong, a foreign affairs adviser to South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun. “The experiments were merely on a laboratory scale and the government had no roles in the experiment” (Agence France-Presse/Channel News Asia, Sept. 22).

Meanwhile, a five-member team from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived Sunday at a South Korean nuclear facility to begin a weeklong inspection, according to Agence France-Presse (see GSN, Sept. 16).

The team traveled to the Korean Atomic Energy Research Institute, about 100 miles south of Seoul, and is expected to report its findings to the U.N. agency by November, AFP reported. The purpose of the inspection is to interview South Korean nuclear scientists, following the revelation of the country’s experiments involving enriched uranium and plutonium (Agence France-Presse/SpaceWar.com, Sept. 20).

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