Q&A: N Korea nuclear stand-off

Q&A: N Korea nuclear stand-off

North Korea has claimed to have successfully tested a nuclear device. BBC News looks at the crisis over North Korea's nuclear ambitions, and the likely ramifications.

Why does this issue matter so much?

The nuclear test follows four years of mounting tension between North Korea and the US, in what is possibly the most serious threat to East Asia's short and long-term security.

If a nuclear test is confirmed, it will cement North Korea's place as a nuclear power, effectively ending hopes of resolving the stand-off through stalled six-nation talks. It would also greatly increase the risk of an East Asian arms race, as countries like Japan and South Korea weighed up whether to go nuclear as well.


Why has North Korea decided to test now?

The secretive North's leader Kim Jong-il appears to have given up negotiating.

He may have decided the US was never going to meet his conditions for giving up the North's nuclear programmes. North Korea's official media has long warned that the US was preparing to attack, and developing a nuclear capability was the only way to prevent this.

Mr Kim may also still be smarting after China, the North's only real ally, backed UN sanctions against the country in July.

Left isolated, Mr Kim may have felt that a nuclear test was the best way to shore up his own authority at home.


What do we know about North Korea's nuclear weapons programme?

North Korea claims to be working on building up its nuclear weapons arsenal.

The problem for the rest of the world is that it is very difficult to verify these claims.

Most arms control experts suspect North Korea did pursue an active weapons programme - certainly up to 1994, when it signed a landmark agreement to freeze all nuclear-related activities.

But in December 2002, it restarted its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon and forced two UN nuclear monitors to leave the country.

It is unclear how far work has progressed at Yongbyon since then.

If the reactor were fully operational, some analysts believe it could produce enough plutonium to build approximately one weapon per year.

America's CIA says a separate, enriched uranium programme could be producing "two or more" bombs each year by the middle of this decade.



How many weapons does North Korea already possess?

This is very hard to say without full IAEA inspections. Experts believe that North Korea may have extracted sufficient plutonium for a small number of bombs.

US officials have put the number at "one or two".

About 8,000 spent fuel rods that were put into storage in 1994 could also be used to extract enough weapons-grade plutonium for a handful more weapons, the US believes.

North Korea has said it has already finished reprocessing these fuel rods, although South Korean and US intelligence are unsure whether to believe that claim.

Other estimates say the North may now have eight or more bombs.


Could North Korea now drop a nuclear bomb?


Although the North appears to have successfully tested a nuclear device, security analysts do not believe it has managed to make a device small enough to deliver on a missile.

This implies that for now at least, its only way of dropping a bomb would be via aircraft, which the US and its allies would be able to monitor.

However, the North is also working on long range missiles, one of which is believed to have a potential range of several thousand kilometres.

The test will add to pressure on Japan to speed up its missile defences, and also may add to calls for Japan to have a nuclear deterrent too, though the US would firmly oppose this.

Wasn't there an agreement in 2005 that was meant to have resolved the stand-off?

Yes, but that agreement is now in tatters.

In fact, the optimism only lasted a day because the most difficult parts of the stand-off - such as whether North Korea has an undisclosed uranium programme - were not mentioned in the agreement. There was no mention of what happens to North Korea's existing nuclear facilities, and neither was the issue of future verification made clear.


What is the background to the crisis?

Relations between the US and North Korea have been deteriorating since President George W Bush labelled North Korea part of an "axis of evil" in January 2002.

Tensions really started escalating the following October, when the US accused North Korea of developing a secret, uranium-based nuclear weapons programme.

Washington is not only concerned about the development of such weapons in North Korea, but also wants to curb Pyongyang's capacity to export missile and nuclear technology to other states or organisations.

Since the October 2002 confrontation, North Korea has restarted a mothballed nuclear power station, thrown out inspectors from the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency and pulled out of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.

It has also upped its frequently doom-laden rhetoric, warning of the risk of nuclear war.

It is often very difficult to tell what lies behind North Korea's moves. Pyongyang and its mercurial leader Kim Jong-il act in erratic and contradictory ways.

But it seems possible that North Korea has been trying to use the nuclear issue as a hard-line ploy to negotiate a non-aggression pact and improved economic aid from the US.

Now that it appears to have given up with negotiation, other countries in the region and the US will have to urgently rethink their strategy.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2340405.stm