N. Korea Destroys Nuke Cooling Tower

Blast Is Symbolic Gesture Of Cooperation Following Bush's Agreement To Drop Some Sanctions

(CBS/AP)  North Korea destroyed the most visible symbol of its nuclear weapons program Friday, blasting apart the cooling tower at an atomic reactor in a sign of its commitment to stop making plutonium for atomic bombs.

The demolition of the 60-foot-tall cooling tower at the North's main reactor complex is a response to U.S. concessions after the North delivered a declaration Thursday of its nuclear programs to be dismantled.

A single blast at the base of the cylindrical structure sent the tower collapsing into a cloud of white and gray smoke as international journalists and diplomats looked on, according to video footage filmed by broadcaster APTN at the site. Those at the event later pored over the shattered pieces of the tower.

"This is a very important step in the disablement process and I think it puts us in a good position to move into the next phase," said Sung Kim, the U.S. State Department's top expert on the Koreas who attended the demolition. Kim shook hands with North Korean officials following the tower's tumble to the ground.

The symbolic explosion came just 20 months after Pyongyang shocked the world by detonating a nuclear bomb in an underground test to confirm its status as an atomic power. The nuclear blast spurred an about-face in the U.S. hard-line policy against Pyongyang, leading to the North's first steps to scale back its nuclear weapons development since the reactor became operational in 1986.

Last year, the North switched off the reactor at Yongbyon, some 60 miles north of the capital of Pyongyang, and it has already begun disabling the facility under the watch of U.S. experts so that it cannot easily be restarted.

The destruction of the cooling tower, which carries off waste heat to the atmosphere, is another step forward but not the most technically significant, because it is a simple piece of equipment that would be easy to rebuild.

Still, the demolition offered the most photogenic moment yet in the disarmament negotiations that have dragged on for more than five years and suffered repeated deadlocks and delays. Those attending the event include the top U.S. State Department expert on the Koreas, Sung Kim, along with broadcasters from the United States, China, Japan, Russia and South Korea.

The North has incentives to stay in Washington's good graces. President Bush said he would lift economic sanctions imposed under a U.S. law banning trade with enemy nations and that he would notify Congress that Washington would remove North Korea from a State Department list of terrorism-sponsoring countries in 45 days.

Hours after blowing up the cooling tower, the North's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it "positively assesses" and "welcomes" the U.S. measures, and also urged Washington to completely withdraw its "hostile policy" toward Pyongyang.

The energy-starved country is also receiving the equivalent of 1 million tons of heavy fuel oil for the initial disarmament steps.

"If North Korea continues to make the right choices it can repair its relationship with the international community. ... If North Korea makes the wrong choices, the United States and its partners in the six-party talks will act accordingly," Mr. Bush said.

The North's goodwill could also overcome obstacles to delivery of Washington's promised food aid of 500,000 tons and encourage other nations to join in providing humanitarian assistance for its impoverished 23 million people. The World Food Program says the first shipment of the U.S. food aid is supposed to arrive in Pyongyang this week, although food is not part of the sanctions or nuclear negotiations.

North Korea faces its worst food shortages in years due to severe floods that devastated farmland in 2007. It has relied on foreign handouts to feed its population since mismanagement and natural disasters devastated its economy in the mid-1990s, when as many as 2 million people are estimated to have died of famine.

The U.S. has acknowledged it is still far from the goal of disarming the North.

North Korea's nuclear declaration, which was delivered six months later than promised and has not yet been released publicly, was a slimmed down version of what the Bush administration initially sought, reported CBS News chief foreign affairs correspondent Lara Logan.

The document said nothing about the nuclear weapons they have in stock, and nothing about their uranium enrichment program. Furthermore, the document revealed nothing about how North Korea is proliferating nuclear technology around the world, reported Logan.

The declaration was being distributed Friday by China, the chair of the arms talks, to the other countries involved, U.S. envoy Christopher Hill said in Kyoto, Japan.

"We'll have to study it very carefully and then we'll have to work on verification," Hill said.

Experts believe the North has as much as 110 pounds of weapons-grade plutonium, enough for as many as 10 nuclear bombs.

To verify the claim of how much radioactive material it has produced, the U.S. says the North will open access to its reactor for inspectors to pore over the aging equipment and come to their own conclusions. However, there will be no wide-ranging inspections to survey secret nuclear facilities, some of which are believed hidden in underground tunnels.

The declaration also does not include information on the North's alleged uranium enrichment program or its possible nuclear proliferation to other countries, such as Syria.

North Korea now views its reactor as "just large pieces of rusting metal," having already amassed enough nuclear weapons to deter any would-be attacker, said Andrei Lankov, an expert on the North who studied there and is a professor at Seoul's Kookmin University.

"For the dual purposes of blackmail and security, it's sufficient to have a small number of nuclear devices," he said.

Lankov said the North Koreans will likely never come entirely clean on its bombs.

"They know that without nuclear weapons, nobody will care about them," he said.

[terrorislami]

FASCIST NAZI TERRORISLAM IS THE PROBLEM,,,

DEMONIC-RAT HUSSEIN IS NOT THE SOLUTION,,,

[terrorislami]

YOU DO NOT WANT THE USA IN THE MIDDLE EAST?

BLAME THE DEMONIC-RATS

THE DEMONIC-RAT DOCTRINE,,,

On February 16, 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt said the "the defense of Saudi Arabia is vital to the defense of the United States." On February 14, 1945, while returning from the Yalta Conference, Roosevelt met with King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia on the Great Bitter Lake in the Suez Canal, the first time a U.S. president had visited the Persian Gulf region.

The Carter Doctrine was a policy proclaimed by President of the United States Jimmy Carter in his State of the Union Address on 23 January 1980, which stated that the United States would use military force if necessary to defend its national interests in the Persian Gulf region. The doctrine was a response to the 1979 invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union, and was intended to deter the Soviet Union%u2014the Cold War adversary of the United States%u2014from seeking hegemony in the Persian Gulf. After stating that Soviet troops in Afghanistan posed "a grave threat to the free movement of Middle East oil," Carter proclaimed:

Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force. (full speech)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carter_Doctrine

[inventagod2]

6/26/08

''I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, find that the current existence and risk of the proliferation of weapons-usable fissile material on the Korean Peninsula constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States, and I hereby declare a ''national emergency'' to deal with that threat.''

What''s Dubya up to this time???

[karenaolson]

We should just Nuke North and South Korea as practice before we nuke China. They are all scumbags that need to die by the hand of America. Join us at www.theoandavirus.com

[sociald63]

that was NO nuke tower - it was an old sam''s club warehouse

[sociald63]

that was NO nuke tower - it was an old sam''s club warehouse

[rgrxx175]

mccain just got a slap in the face by his own buddy bush, ha ha ha

[chimpyout]

So, now that North Korea has "destroyed" its nucular capability, does that mean it is a "beacon of freedom," or is it merely what Congolisa calls an "outpost of tyranny?"

[prairiefox1]

AND WE WILL HAVE LOST ANOTHER ROUND BECAUSE WE PLAYED PATTYCAKE WITH THEM INSTEAD OF NIPPING IT IN THE BUD!

WE SMART!!!!

[prairiefox1]

THIS MEANS ONE OF TWO THINGS, 1. THEY ARE JUST GIVING UP! 2. THEY HAVE COMPLETED THE BOMBS AND ONCE THEY USE THEM THEY WILL BE NUKED AND UNABLE TO MAKE MORE!
SO THEY WILL HAVE ALL THE SANCTIONS LIFTED WHILE THEY GIGGLE AND POLISH THEIR COMPLETED BOMBS!

[extremophil]

It''s a shame they didn''t fill the tower up with North Koreans before they demolished it. That would have been impressive.

[dinkydog1]

"Bush will not participate in politics of appeasement like Clinton.

Korea then restarts its weapon program and builds several nucelar weapons (which they still have).

Bush the decider then appeases Korea with 500,000 tons of food aid, and 1 million tons of fuel oil. In exchange Korea blows up a cooling tower that didn''''''''t work anyway and keeps thier nuclear weapons.

This is great progress for Bush? You Bushies are dumber than a box of rocks.



Posted by dinkydog1"

1) it is North Korea (DPRK), there is no Korea

2) doesn`t your browser have spell-check built in?

3) the US has been in South Korea (ROK) for over 50 years and hopefully helps to illustrate the principle espoused by McCain when he stated we may be in Iraq "100 years from now" - US presence need not indicate hostilities, but rather a peacekeeping role


Posted by vbnvbnvbn at 10:46 AM : Jun 27, 2008

..........

Jezz, I''v been busted by the spelling police again.

OK, if you think policing NORTH Korea (ROK) or Iraq for 100 years is a good idea then I guess McCain is your man.

[neoconrcrazy]

chickenhawk bushit & henchmen have given a clear signal to iran - build your weapon, then negotiate.

our modern day APPEASERS: GOP chickenhawks ! first they attack a defenseless, terrorism free non-participant to 9-11, allowing us to believe they were involved -

and then they take the worst offender (and exporter) of state supporter nuke terror off their sham list.

bushit is a weak-kneed, ****-in-his-pants, zero-minus, F-rated, "president".

[shoebox119]

Good start, North Korea. Okay, America... your turn. You blow up or dismantle a proportionate number of your nuclear arsenal, then Russia, Israel, Pakistan, India...

Hey, if this keeps up, the world will be nuke-free in no time!!

[jlagat]

Bottom line:

Bush surrendered.

This must be a complex joke; he''s just probably doing his best lib impersonation.

[realpatriot1]

barbara4,

We blinked by removing them from the list of terrorist nations while still suspecting them of supplying deadly technology to Iran.

[antoniof123]

Talking works, what a novel idea!

[tbweb]

N. Korea Destroys Nuke Cooling Tower

Iran Builds Nuke Cooling Tower!

Whats wrong with this picture?

[ianlou]

The Damage is done, Kimberly Ill has the bomb.
he no longer needs the reactor.

[wdrussell1]

Remember folks, any progress that was made came after they went to six party talks.