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Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

  1. As I have reported to the Board of Governors and the General Conference, technical discussions have been held with the DPRK with respect to the activities to be carried out pursuant to the safeguards agreement at the DPRK's nuclear facilities including those subject to the freeze. Since the first of these discussions in November last year, arrangements have been in place enabling the Agency to meet many of its objectives. On the other hand, some of the measures required had so far been declined by the DPRK. These were further discussed at a technical meeting in the DPRK from 12 to 18 September 1995. Limited progress was made on some issues but others remain to be resolved.

  2. The DPRK agreed to Agency measurements of the irradiated fuel rods, in storage at the 5 MWe Experimental Reactor, which would verify whether they are all irradiated fuel rods. They did not agree to measures that would provide information on the total amount of plutonium in the spent fuel. This will have to be obtained through measurements, with some limitations in accuracy, at a much later date (more than five years) and could require opening of the containers at significant additional cost.

  3. No agreement was reached on the installation of Agency monitoring equipment at the nuclear waste tanks of the reprocessing plant, needed in addition to the already installed containment and surveillance equipment, to verify on a continuous basis that there is no movement or any operation involving such wastes. This issue remains to be resolved.

  4. At the beginning of the technical meeting the Agency provided a paper to the DPRK, which deals with the preservation of information required by the Agency to verify the correctness and completeness of the initial DPRK declaration. The DPRK indicated its intention to study this paper and discuss it with the Agency at a future meeting.

  5. Some implementation measures which had been agreed in January with the DPRK but which had not been applied due to objections by the operators of the plants, e.g. photographing by inspectors of the new process line of the reprocessing plant, have now been agreed and will be implemented as soon as possible.

  6. Finally, the DPRK has provided a fax and a telephone number through which the Secretariat can now contact its inspectors in the Nyongbyon area.



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