BERLIN, Jan 25: The head of the UN nuclear agency, Mohamed El Baradei, said in an interview released on Sunday that the underground trade in atomic technology means that the threat of nuclear war is greater today than it ever has been.

In an interview with Der Spiegel magazine, ElBaradei said new controls are needed to prevent the black-market trade in nuclear materials and knowledge by "smart nuclear experts, unscrupulous companies and possibly state organs."

"Never was the danger as great as today. An atomic war draws nearer if we do not start thinking about a new international control system," ElBaradei told the weekly newsmagazine.

He said, for example, that he was "extremely concerned" about the possibility of a nuclear weapons programme in North Korea. "I would be in no way surprised if Pyongyang already has an operational atomic bomb," he said. The only solution, he said, was for North Korea to reopen its nuclear facilities to inspectors.

"I worry that the memory of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is beginning to fade," said ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency. "I worry that atomic weapons will fall into the hands of dictators or terrorists.

"I worry also about the nuclear arsenal of democratic states, because as long as these weapons exist there is no absolute guarantee against the catastrophic consequences of theft, sabotage or an accident," he said. -APP