The US is unaware of a new Iran-North Korea nuclear project reported by a Japanese newspaper but is looking into it, US officials said on Thursday.
The Sankei Shimbun, citing an unidentified military source, reported this week North Korea and Iran -- part of what US President George W. Bush has called an "axis of evil" -- were working on a project to build an underground factory in the communist state to produce machinery for enriching uranium.
Uranium is a key ingredient in nuclear weapons and Washington has accused both Iran and the reclusive North of pursuing nuclear weapons programs.
"I have not seen anything to substantiate that," one senior US official said of the Sankei report.
"We saw the report and we're looking into it," he told reporters.
Another senior US official said the newspaper report was the first time he had heard allegations of a North Korea-Iran collaboration but he was skeptical.
"I would think there would have been some indication in the past if indeed there was such a relationship. If there is any truth to this it's a little surprising that it would come out like this," he said.
The newspaper said the two countries agreed to jointly build a plant to make a centrifugal separator in Kusong, 40km northwest of Anju, a site known for nuclear development by Pyongyang.
It said that under the accord, reached during the visit by a senior Iranian military officer to Pyongyang in late January, both nations would use the machinery, with Iran planning to import it as "industrial goods" through a third country, the Sankei said.
North Korea acknowledges a program for producing plutonium, one type of fuel for nuclear bombs. It has denied US charges it is also producing highly-enriched uranium, another type of nuclear bomb fuel.
A global nuclear black market was revealed last month when Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, disclosed he had sold nuclear secrets and technologies to Libya, North Korea and Iran.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS