Siegfried Hecker, a US nuclear scientist, has published a report on his visit to North Korea, where he was shown a facility supposed to process low-enriched uranium once its construction is complete. The report goes on to state that the scientist had a facility containing around two thousand centrifuges shown to him. These are purportedly for the purposes of processing low-enriched uranium for fuel but it is possible to transform them into weapons.

Reacting to the contents of the report, Joint Chief of Staff Head, Adm. Mullen said that North Korea was treading on a path very deadly to the region. North Korea, in September, admitted to be in the last steps of enriching uranium, warning that it was also in the process of processing and making plutonium into weapons.

Hecker, who is a scientist from Stanford University, said that the nuclear plant which is based in Yongbyon, a few miles away from the capital, Pyongyang, was sanitary and sophisticated. It is said to have been constructed using native resources and manpower and although it seems to be a mere civil nuclear power plant, it is easily convertible to a uranium-processing grid.

This report was published in the midst of plans to revive talks with Korea on the nuclear activities in Pyongyang by a US Department Official responsible for the region, Stephen Bosworth. North Korea has expressed conditional agreement to re-enter the negotiating table. It is speculated that the revelations in September might have been a strategy to up its ante at the talks.

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