SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea said on Friday that it was in the
final stage of enriching uranium, a process that would give it a second
path to making a nuclear weapon.
After a series of conciliatory gestures by the North over the past
month, the announcement raises the stakes in efforts by the
international community to convince the reclusive state to give up its
nuclear weapons programme.
"Experimental uranium enrichment has successfully been conducted to
enter into completion phase," the KCNA news agency quoted North Korea's
United Nations delegation as saying in a letter to the head of the U.N.
Security Council (UNSC).
The North has already tested two plutonium-based nuclear devices, the one in May triggering tightened international sanctions.
The Unites States has long suspected that the North has a secret
programme to enrich uranium for weapons. Experts have said it has not
developed anything near a full scale enrichment programme.
The North said its latest moves were in response to tighter sanctions.
"We are prepared for both dialogue and sanctions. If some permanent
members of the UNSC wish to put sanctions first before dialogue, we
would respond with bolstering our nuclear deterrence first before we
meet them in a dialogue."