U.S. Scraps Ban on Enrichment Technology Sale

The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday that the Bush administration has given up its push for an international ban on sales of uranium enrichment technology to non-nuclear states.

The United States will unveil the related plan at the Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting, slated for April 21-22 in Vienna, Austria, and provide a new guideline to prevent any transfer of dangerous technologies, the newspaper reported.

The daily analyzed that the measure the United States has taken could appear to be a concession because it makes a contrast with its usual hard-line approach toward nuclear technology proliferation in the global community. However, it added that such a movement clearly demonstrates the conflicting interests of parties involved in this issue.

The ban on sales of uranium enrichment technology came forth in February 2004 by the demand of U.S. President George W. Bush. Most of G8 countries have maintained this measure by renewing the bill each year, but recently Canada expressed strong opposition, hoping to have the right to build uranium enrichment plants to export the lucrative enriched fuel for nuclear power plants. Although the country produces more than 25 percent of uranium used worldwide, it is not allowed to construct uranium enrichment plants under the current international treaty.

The U.S.-backed guideline is not much different from the previous ones, given that it would bar transfers to countries that are not members of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, or that do not allow full international oversight and inspections.

The United States stressed two rules. One is that any purchasers would have to agree to particularly stringent and wide-ranging U.N.-led oversight and inspections of their nuclear facilities. The other is a requirement that all technologies sold would have to be immune from duplication.

Nonetheless, the possibility of the uranium enrichment technology rapidly spreading across the world cannot be ruled out. The rules may trigger controversy on its fairness because specific countries such as North Korea and Iran are restricted from the technology transfers.

North Korea, which withdrew from the NPT, will not benefit from the new guideline. In this regard, North Korea is likely to express its discontent on the harsh treatment by the United States, raising the issue of requirement to report on uranium enrichment program and its suspicious technology cooperation with Syria, which remain as stumbling blocks for resuming the six-party talks.

“It is hard to see how this would deal with the problem that there are already too many people enriching and reprocessing nuclear fuel," said John Wolf, a former top nonproliferation official at the U.S. State Department.

spear@donga.com