December 24, 2002	Tuesday	Shawwal 19, 1423

WASHINGTON, Dec 23: The US State Department said on Sunday that North Korea has disrupted arrangements for international monitoring of spent fuel rods at its nuclear facilities and warned Kim Jong Il’s government against restarting its nuclear programme. The 8,000-odd spent fuel rods at these facilities could be reprocessed to recover plutonium for nuclear weapons, the State Department said.

Removing the surveillance devices “raises further serious concerns and belies North Korea’s announced justification to produce electricity,” State Department spokesman Lou Fintor told Dawn. “The spent fuel rods have no relevance for the generation of electricity.”

“We urge North Korea not to restart its frozen nuclear facilities,” he said.

Fintor said the United States is consulting with the IAEA “and confirming what steps the North Koreans have taken.”

He said Washington was also “in close contact with friends and allies and other concerned parties.”

Secretary of State Colin Powell, he said, already has consulted with the foreign ministers of South Korea, Japan, Russia and China, among others.

“A move to restart them would fly in the face of the international consensus that the North Korean regime must fulfill all its commitments and in particular, dismantle its covert nuclear weapons programme,” Fintor said.

“The international community had been reaching out to North Korea to try to assist it in dealing with its severe poverty and other serious problems,” Fintor said. “That effort has been undermined by North Korea’s pursuit of a covert nuclear programme and its latest action (at Yongbyon).”

Fintor added: “Let me underscore that the United States will not enter into dialogue in response to threats or broken commitments, and we will not bargain or offer inducements for North Korea to live up to the treaties and agreements it has signed.

“We seek a peaceful resolution of the situation that North Korea has created by its pursuit of a nuclear weapons programme and will continue our consultations with friends and allies in light of the latest moves by the North Korean regime.”