VIENNA — There is no sign North Korea reprocessed spent fuel from its main nuclear reactor into plutonium in the past year, but it seems to have continued to enrich uranium, the other potential fuel for atom bombs, the U.N. atomic watchdog said. The International Atomic Energy Agency has not had access to North Korea since the secretive communist state expelled its inspectors in 2009. Pyongyang pressed ahead with its nuclear weapons programme and soon resumed nuclear testing. Since its expulsion the agency has been monitoring North Korea's activities from afar, including with satellite imagery. It is "almost certain" the experimental 5-megawatt reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear complex, which is widely believed to have produced plutonium for weapons, has been shut down since early December 2018, the IAEA said in an annual report https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/gc/gc64-18.pdf dated Sept. 1 and posted online.

Source: International New York Times September 02, 2020 10:18 UTC