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| North Korea to restart nuclear reactor in weapons bid - Reuters Posted: 02 Apr 2013 07:18 AM PDT  SEOUL | (Reuters) - North Korea said on Tuesday it would revive a mothballed nuclear reactor able to produce bomb-grade plutonium but stressed it was seeking a deterrent capacity and did not repeat recent threats to attack South Korea and the United States. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the crisis over North Korea had gone too far and he appealed for dialogue and negotiation to resolve the situation. "Nuclear threats are not a game. Aggressive rhetoric and military posturing only result in counter-actions, and fuel fear and instability," Ban, a South Korean, told a news conference during a visit to Andorra. The crisis flared after Pyongyang was hit with U.S. sanctions for conducting a third nuclear test in February and the United States and South Korea staged military drills that North Korea viewed as "hostile". Pyongyang then threatened a nuclear strike on the United States, missile strikes on its Pacific bases and war with South Korea, prompting Washington to bolster forces in the region. The state-owned KCNA news agency announced on Tuesday that North Korea would relaunch all nuclear facilities for both electricity and military uses. One of the most isolated and unpredictable states in the world, North Korea carried out its third nuclear test since 2006 but is seen as some years away from producing a deliverable nuclear weapon, although it claims to have a deterrent. A speech by the North's young leader, Kim Jong-un, given on Sunday but published in full by KCNA on Tuesday, appeared to dampen any prospect of a direct confrontation with the United States by emphasizing that nuclear weapons would ensure the country's safety as a deterrent. "Our nuclear strength is a reliable war deterrent and a guarantee to protect our sovereignty," Kim said. "It is on the basis of a strong nuclear strength that peace and prosperity can exist and so can the happiness of people's lives." Kim's speech, delivered to the central committee meeting of the ruling Workers Party of Korea, hinted at a small shift away from threats against Seoul and Washington, but it remained some distance from calling any kind of end to the crisis. "The fact that this (speech) was made at the party central committee meeting, which is the highest policy-setting organ, indicates an attempt to highlight economic problems and shift the focus from security to the economy," said Yang Moo-jin of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul. PLUTONIUM PRODUCTION But if Pyongyang indeed restarts the nuclear facilities, it would have longer-term implications for the region's security. Reactivating the aged Soviet-era reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear plant would yield plutonium, a tested path to stockpile more fissile material than a uranium enrichment program. It was unclear how quickly Yongbyon, whose cooling tower was destroyed as part of an earlier de-nuclearization deal with major powers, would take to restart. It was also impossible to verify whether Yongbyon remained connected to North Korea's antiquated electricity grid at all. "It was a reactor that was nearing obsolescence with a cooling tower that wasn't functioning properly when it was blown up. It could mean they've been rebuilding quite a few things," said Yoo Ho-yeol, North Korea specialist at Korea University in Seoul. The move to restart the reactor undermines China's stated aim of restarting de-nuclearization talks on the Korean peninsula, prompting a foreign ministry spokesman in Beijing to express regret at the decision. The United Nations secretary-general said "things must calm down as this situation, made worse by the lack of communication, could lead down a path that nobody should want to follow". Ban offered to help the parties to begin talks. "I am convinced that nobody intends to attack (North Korea) because of disagreements about its political system or foreign policy. However, I am afraid that others will respond firmly to any direct military provocation," he said. As well as reviving the 5MW reactor at Yongbyon, the North's only known source of plutonium for its nuclear arms program, KCNA said a uranium enrichment plant would also be put back into operation. The nuclear plant's output would be used to solve what KCNA termed an "acute shortage of electricity" and to bolster "the nuclear armed force". NO SIGN OF N.KOREAN MILITARY MOVES The United States has bolstered forces staging joint drills with South Korea with Stealth fighters and made bomber overflights in a rare show of strength to Pyongyang. Overnight, Washington deployed a warship off the Korean coast. The United States has said it has seen no evidence of hostile North Korean troop movements. Much of the North Korean rhetoric in recent weeks has echoed previous bouts of anger, but the length and intensity has been new, raising to concerns that the tensions could spiral into actual fighting. In Washington, the White House has said the United States takes North Korea's war threats seriously. But White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Monday: "I would note that despite the harsh rhetoric we are hearing from Pyongyang, we are not seeing changes to the North Korean military posture, such as large-scale mobilizations and positioning of forces." A U.S. defense official said on Monday the USS McCain, an Aegis-class guided-missile destroyer used for ballistic missile defense, was positioned off the peninsula's southwestern coast. It was not immediately clear where the ship was on Tuesday. MOOD CHANGE In Pyongyang, the party congress meeting and a subsequent assembly of the country's rubber-stamp parliament repeated the usual anti-American rhetoric and criticized South Korea, but the broad mood appeared to have changed. The pariah state has once again started emphasizing economic development as it shifts to the major April 15 celebration of the birth of its founder, Kim Il Sung, grandfather of the current ruler. For the young Kim, it appears that cementing control of the party and state has now taken top priority as well as improving living standards in a country whose economy is smaller than it was 20 years ago, according to external assessments. Kim appointed a handful of personal confidants to the party's politburo, further consolidating his grip on power in the second full year of his reign. Former premier Pak Pong-ju, a key ally of the leadership dynasty, was re-appointed to the post from which he was fired in 2007 for failing to implement economic reforms. Pak, believed to be in his 70s, is viewed as a key confidant of Jang Song-thaek, the young Kim's uncle and also a protege of Kim's aunt. Pak is also seen as a pawn in a power game that has seen Jang and his wife reassert control over military leaders. (Additional reporting by Paul Eckert, Phil Stewart, David Alexander and Jeff Mason in Washington, Julien Toyer in Madrid and Stephanie Ulmer-Nebehay in Geneva; Editing by David Chance and Mark Heinrich) |
| General Assembly Passes Landmark UN Treaty on Arms Trade - New York Times Posted: 02 Apr 2013 08:57 AM PDT By NEIL MacFARQUHARPublished: April 2, 2013UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to approve the first-ever treaty to regulate the enormous global trade in conventional weapons, for the first time linking sales to the human-rights records of the buyers. The vote on the Arms Trade Treaty came after an effort to achieve a consensus on the treaty among all 193 member states of the United Nations failed last week, with Iran, North Korea and Syria blocking it. Those three countries, often ostracized as pariahs, contended the treaty was full of deficiencies and had been structured to be unfair to them. The treaty would require states exporting conventional weapons to develop criteria that would link exports to avoiding human-rights abuses, terrorism and organized crime. It would also ban shipments if they were deemed harmful to women and children. Countries that join the treaty would have to report publicly on sales every year, exposing the process to levels of transparency that rights groups hope will strictly limit illicit weapons deals. The vote was heavily lopsided in favor, with 154 supporting it and three opposing. Twenty-three, including a handful of Latin American countries as well as Russia — one of the largest arms exporters — abstained. Vitaly I. Churkin, the Russian envoy to the United Nations, said Russian misgivings about what he called ambiguities in the treaty, including how terms like genocide would be defined, had pushed his government to abstain. Support was particularly strong among many African countries — even if the compromise text was weaker than some had anticipated — with most governments asserting that over the long run the treaty would curb the arms sales that have fueled so many conflicts. Nations can begin joining the treaty in early June, and it goes into effect as international law once 50 have ratified it. Given that the vote in the General Assembly was so overwhelmingly in support, it is expected to go into effect this year. In the run-up to the vote on Tuesday, numerous states objected to the treaty because they said it was heavily weighted in favor of the exporters — allowing them to make subjective judgments about which states met the humanitarian guidelines. The treaty could be abused in the future as a means to foment unjust political pressure, said several countries, including Cuba, Nicaragua and Syria. What impact it will have on the global conventional weapons trade — and over what period of time — is a more difficult question. Experts are certain it will change things eventually. In the shorter term it is more difficult to assess. The United States and many European countries say they already have arms sales guidelines in effect that tie sales to the human-rights records of the buyers and other issues included in the treaty. It is considered unlikely that the treaty will have any effect on the supply of outside weapons to the Syrian government, for example, because Iran is opposed to it and Russia is hesitant. Both are the main conduits for conventional weapons to Damascus. Those who pushed hard for the treaty, especially among rights groups, thought it would have an important long-term impact, however. "The Arms Trade Treaty provides a powerful alternative to the body-bag approach currently used to respond to humanitarian crises," said Raymond Offenheiser, the president of Oxfam America. "Today nations enact arms embargoes in response to humanitarian crises only after a mass loss of life. The treaty prohibits the weapon sales in the first place." It should help shut down safe havens where rogue arms dealers can sell weapons to war criminals with impunity, he said. Frank Jannuzi, head of Amnesty International's Washington office, said the final draft of the treaty was not perfect but represented what many rights groups considered an enormous advance. "To the extent that there's any enforcement mechanism in this treaty, it's an actual benchmark in which we can judge states' behavior, whereas before it was extremely subjective," he said. "Now there's a process. So that's a step forward. For all those unlicensed exports that end up fueling violence, this treaty begins to get a handle on that through much more rigorous licensing and reporting." The treaty covers trade in tanks, armored combat vehicles, large-caliber weapons, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles and launchers, small arms and light weapons. Ammunition exports are subject to the same criteria as the other war matériel. Imports are not covered. Asked about the potential impact of the treaty, Thomas M. Countryman, the assistant secretary of state who led the American delegation to the talks, said he did not expect an instant impact on the level of trade nor the level of violence around the world. But over a longer period of time, he said before the vote, "I think it will contribute to a reduction in violence." More states will impose controls on their own legal exports and the treaty demands more effective action against black-market arms brokers and the diversion of weapons, he said. Despite repeated assurances by Obama administration officials that the treaty would not affect American domestic use of firearms or the Second Amendment, the National Rifle Association has criticized the treaty and vowed to fight ratification in the Senate. Mr. Countryman downplayed any negative effect on the American arms industry, which accounts for about 30 percent of the $60 billion to $70 billion annual trade in conventional arms. "This treaty will bring much of the rest of the world not up to the American standards but much closer to the American standards," he said. "In that sense, I believe it levels the playing field and gives American manufacturers a better competitive position in the world. " There were also doubters. The seven years of negotiations and repeated efforts to water down the treaty raised doubts about just how sincere the implementation might be. "It is clear that while many countries want a strong and robust treaty," said Lyndira Oudit, a senator from Trinidad and Tobago and a member of a group of international legislators who pushed for passage, "some actually seem to want a weak one, with vague language and narrow definitions, which allow for wide interpretation and maintenance of the status quo, both of players and of process." Indonesia, Russia, Syria and others objected to the fact that the treaty did not ban outright arms transfers to rebel groups and other nonstate actors. Western nations, including the largest arms exporters, opposed any specific reference to nonstate actors because they argued that there were times when national liberation movements needed protection from abusive governments. Supporters said the treaty covers nonstate actors because all conventional weapons sales will be judged under the same criteria, and refers to "unauthorized end user or end users."
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