- (AFP) -- President George W. Bush faced up to a nuclear
crisis with "axis of evil" foe North Korea, with the United States
already deeply committed to a battle against global terrorism and preparing
for war with Iraq.
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- The stunning US announcement late Wednesday that North
Korea's had confessed it had a secret nuclear weapons program, sent diplomatic
shockwaves around the world, and left officials in a conundrum over their
next move with Pyongyang.
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- They must decide whether the admission poses an immediate
threat to the security of the United States and its Asian allies, or is
a typical crisis-inducing bargaining ploy by impoverished North Korea designed
to secure concessions and aid.
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- Japan and South Korea, awaiting talks with a US envoy
over the building storm, put up a calm front, stressing their dialogues
with Stalinist leader Kim Jong-Il would go on.
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- North Korean officials admitted they had continued to
develop nuclear weapons in violation of a 1994 agreement in talks earlier
this month with senior State Department official James Kelly, State Department
spokesman Richard Boucher said.
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- Pyongyang considers the deal, known as the Agreed Framework,
under which they agreed to freeze their nuclear programme, "nullified,"
he added.
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- "The United States and our allies call on North
Korea to comply with its commitments under the Non-Proliferation Treaty,
and to eliminate its nuclear weapons program in a verifiable manner,"
Boucher said in the statement.
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- Based on the admission, US officials felt that at this
time there was no basis for a give and take dialogue with North Korea,
which only reopened in early October after a near-two year hiatus.
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- Kelly presented North Korean officials with evidence
of the nuclear program during his October 3-5 visit, and at first they
called the allegations a "fabrication," a senior administration
official said.
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- But a day later, Deputy Foreign Minister Kang Sok Joo
confirmed the allegations after an all-night meeting of North Korean officials.
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- Kang also said North Korea had also built "more
powerful" weapons, but the US officials were uncertain what he meant.
He may have been referring to weapons of mass destruction, including biological
ones, the official said.
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- Officials would not comment on whether the highly enriched
uranium used in the program was ready to be turned into a weapons.
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- Bush left the White House early on Thursday for a trip
to Georgia and Florida without speaking to reporters.
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- He has made no secret of his distaste for North Korea
which pumps massive funds into its military while its population teeters
on the brink of starvation.
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- Bush has said he also does not trust Kim Jong-Il and
branded North Korea one third of an "axis of evil" including
Iran and Iraq, states which he fears could offer weapons of mass destruction
to terrorists.
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- Officials said last night that the United States was
looking for a peaceful way out of the crisis. he administration had waited
for nearly two weeks since Kelly returned from Pyongyang to disclose North
Korea's confession.
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- North Korea's admission appears to cast a 1994 deal with
the United States which averted a looming war and ended its nuclear weapons
program in return for the provision of two atomic power reactors in grave
doubt.
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- The European Union said it may be forced to review its
20 million dollar-a-year contribution to a consortium building the plant,
the Korean peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO).
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- Kelly, who left Wednesday on a mission to Beijing, now
plans to go to Seoul and Tokyo over the weekend to discuss the crisis.
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