Nuclear Pattern Seen in S. Korea

The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Monday that he was “seriously concerned” about covert nuclear experiments conducted by South Korean scientists dating back to the 1980s and promised to investigate further.

Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, described a pattern of repeated violations by South Korea over the years. Others familiar with the agency’s investigation said South Korean researchers had tried to block inspections and cover up the evidence of nuclear experiments before finally admitting to them this year.

Among the most damaging charges in a report ElBaradei made to a meeting of the IAEA board of governors was that South Korea had three undeclared nuclear facilities, one of which was used in the 1980s to produce more than 330 pounds of uranium. South Korea has admitted that its scientists enriched a small amount of that uranium in 2000.

The agency discovered traces of plutonium at a shuttered laboratory on the outskirts of Seoul. The material was apparently produced in unauthorized experiments in 1982.

Under its nonproliferation commitments, South Korea is not allowed to make plutonium or enriched uranium, which can be used to make nuclear bombs.

South Korean officials maintain that all these experiments were conducted on a laboratory scale by a handful of scientists without approval from the government.

“Some people can make mistakes, and in this case some scientists, very ambitious in terms of ... their scientific inquisitiveness in certain of the aspects of nuclear materials, went a little bit further without any authorization of the government,” said Cho Chang Beom, South Korean ambassador to the U.N. nuclear agency.

Although South Korea’s infractions appear to be relatively minor, the diplomatic fallout could be enormous.

Nuclear-related activities by a close U.S. ally could undermine the Bush administration’s efforts to rein in nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran. And South Korea’s actions could set a dangerous precedent for other countries that might question their commitment to nonproliferation.

“South Korea didn’t have a full-fledged weapons program, but clearly they wanted to hedge their bets,” said Daniel Pinkston, a nuclear expert and visiting professor at Korea University in Seoul. “As the world becomes more unstable, one wonders if other states as well will do the same, fearing they don’t want to be the one country caught without a nuclear deterrent.”

Until the 1970s, South Korea was engaged in a full-fledged effort to become a nuclear power -- and was on the verge of acquiring a reprocessing plant from France to produce plutonium. But under pressure from the United States, it abandoned those efforts and agreed not to produce any nuclear fuel, even for its civilian nuclear program.

Kang Jung Min, a nuclear policy analyst based in Seoul, said many scientists in South Korea have long bristled at the restrictions, which they say are more stringent than those on other signatories to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, such as Japan.

“A large portion of the South Korean nuclear researchers want to do experiments in enrichment and reprocessing, but they can’t do so without American approval, and they feel there is a double standard,” Kang said.

At Monday’s meeting, ElBaradei said the South Korean government was now cooperating fully with the investigation, which is expected to be completed in November. He declined to say whether the IAEA would refer the case to the U.N. Security Council.

“Clearly, any activities that involve the separation of plutonium or enrichment of uranium are matters of serious concern from a proliferation perspective, and therefore we are going to treat them with the seriousness they deserve,” ElBaradei said.

Meanwhile, North Korea lashed out at the South, accusing its rival of spreading false rumors about a nuclear test in the North in order to distract from its own troubles with the IAEA.

On Sunday, South Korean and U.S. news agencies reported that a huge explosion had taken place early Thursday in a mountainous region of North Korea near the Chinese border. North Korea said Monday that the blast was from a demolition project to clear away a mountainside for a hydroelectric dam.

“The story about the explosion is nothing but a sheer fabrication intended to divert elsewhere the world public attention focused on the nuclear-related issue of South Korea for which they are now finding themselves in a dire fix,” the official North Korean KCNA news service said.

In Washington, a State Department official declined to comment, referring a reporter to comments made last weekend in Geneva by John R. Bolton, undersecretary of State for arms control and international security.

In those remarks, Bolton said there would be no double standard in the administration’s response to nations that are found to violate the safeguard agreements of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

However, Bolton said the exact nature of the South Korean actions remained unclear, and he indicated that the U.S. would probably not respond substantively until the IAEA’s November meeting, when more details of the South Korean case become available.

“Despite the chatter in some quarters, I want to make very clear that the United States will proceed to its decision on how to treat this matter considering the facts that the IAEA brings to us, but with no double standard at all,” Bolton said.

Demick reported from Beijing and Yee from Vienna. Times staff writer Tyler Marshall in Washington contributed to this report.