U.S. to review nuke agreement with N.K.

The Bush administration will seek to modify the North Korea-U.S. nuclear agreement designed to deter the North¡¯s capability to develop nuclear arms, the Sankei Shimbun of Japan reported Sunday.

In a report datelined in Washington, the Japanese newspaper said that the Bush government has decided to place top priority in its negotiations with the North on the reduction of the North¡¯s war capability.

The paper, quoting unidentified sources, reported that the Bush administration apparently was deciding on a plan to review fully the U.S.-North Korea nuclear agreement signed in 1994 on the ground that there were serious defects in the inspection or verification of the North¡¯s suspected nuclear facilities.

¡°The Bush administration sees the Clinton administration¡¯s decision to replace one of the two light-water reactors it promised to build for the North with thermal power plant facilities is itself a big element for the change of the agreement, and decided to maintain it,¡± the paper said.

The Clinton administration agreed to build two light-water reactors for power generation in North Korea in return for the suspension of its development of a nuclear reactor of black lead reduction, which can be used to extract plutonium, in according to the agreement.

But in October last year, it notified both South and North Korea of its plan to replace one of the two plants with a thermal power plant, the newspaper reported.