Six-party talks out of question unless N. Korea`s uranium issue is addressed: senior official

WASHINGTON, Feb. 26 (Yonhap) -- South Korea cannot agree to resume six-party
talks on North Korea's nuclear programs unless the illicit nature of Pyongyang's
uranium enrichment is clearly defined first, a senior official said Friday.
"We have to get the (U.N.) Security Council to define the nature of this matter
and take corresponding steps," the official told South Korean reporters in
Washington. "The point is that the international community should define the
North's UEP (uranium enrichment program) issue as a violation of Security Council
resolutions that should be stopped."
North Korea revealed in November that it was running a uranium enrichment
facility, adding to international concerns about its nuclear capabilities.
Uranium, if highly enriched, can be used to make weapons, prodiving Pyongyang
with a second way of building atomic bombs after its existing plutonium-based
program.
Pyongyang has said the purpose of the facility is to produce fuel for a
power-generating nuclear reactor and that the country has the right to peaceful
use of nuclear energy. But few believe the claim by a regime that has pursued
nuclear ambitions for decades and conducted nuclear tests twice.
South Korea and the United States have called for a tough response to the uranium
program, including taking the matter to the Security Council. But China, the
North's last remaining major ally with veto powers at the council, has been the
biggest obstacle to the move.
Earlier this week, China blocked the Security Council from adopting an experts'
report denouncing the uranium program. Beijing is concerned that such a move
could aggravate tensions and insists that the issue should be discussed at
six-party talks.
"Uranium enrichment is another route to nuclear weapons development, along with
plutonium. Anybody would know the intentions behind uranium enrichment by North
Korea, which conducted nuclear tests twice," the senior South Korean official
said. "It is not the right approach to leave this issue as it is and go discuss
it at six-party talks."
Unless the program's nature is defined first, six-party talks cannot make any
substantial progress, even if reconvened, because the North is sure to claim at
the talks that the program is for peaceful purposes, the official said.
The six-party talks, which bring together the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia
and the U.S., have been stalled since December 2008 due to North Korea's boycott
and tensions over its provocations.
(END)