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North Korea plans uranium enrichment

SINGAPORE: North Korea on Saturday announced its intention to take the uranium enrichment path for producing nuclear weapons.

Reacting to the new United Nations Security Council’s sanctions, Pyongyang said the current plutonium-based path would also continue to be pursued. The sanctions were announced on Friday in response to North Korea’s second nuclear-weapon test on May 25. North Korea’s state news agency quoted the country’s Foreign Ministry as saying that “the process of uranium enrichment will be commenced.” Pyongyang also affirmed its intention to weaponise all the plutonium that could be extracted at the recently-restarted nuclear complex in Yongbyon. On Saturday, the North Korean Foreign Ministry made two other pronouncements. “It has become an absolutely impossible option for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to even think about giving up its nuclear weapons.” Referring to the new possibility of international inspections of the North Korean vessels suspected of carrying nuclear-weapons-grade materials, the Foreign Ministry said: “An attempted blockade of any kind by the United States and its followers will be regarded as an act of war and met with a decisive military response.”

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