UN nuclear watchdog could send inspectors to DPRK 'within weeks'

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The United Nations atomic watchdog said Tuesday that if a deal was reached with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) to give up its nuclear program then it would be ready to send in inspectors within weeks – if asked – to verify and monitor denuclearization.

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Yukiya Amano told the UN Security Council that the IAEA was the only international organization equipped to carry out the job "in an impartial, independent and objective manner."

"Subject to the approval of our Board of Governors, we could respond within weeks to any request to send inspectors back to the DPRK," he told the 15-member council during a meeting on the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

U.S. President Donald Trump and DPRK leader Kim Jong Un have met twice in the past year to discuss denuclearization. Their second meeting in Hanoi broke up because of failure to reach a deal on the extent of economic sanctions relief for the DPRK in exchange for steps to give up its nuclear program.

DPRK leader Kim Jong Un (R1) listens as U.S. President Donald Trump (L1) speaks during the extended bilateral meeting during their summit in Hanoi, Vietnam, February 28, 2019. /Reuters Photo

The DPRK is under tough UN Security Council sanctions that have been steadily tightened since 2006 to choke off funding for Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

The Vienna-based IAEA has not had access to the DPRK since Pyongyang expelled its inspectors in 2009, and it now monitors the country's nuclear activities mainly through satellite imagery. It said last month that the DPRK nuclear reactor that supplied much of the plutonium for the DPRK's nuclear weapons was believed to have been shut down for the past three months.

Amano said that sending in IAEA inspectors "would help to make the implementation of any agreement sustainable." "It would also contribute to the denuclearization of the DPRK in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner, as required by numerous resolutions of the Security Council," he said.

The IAEA already monitors the implementation of a 2015 deal between Iran and world powers to curb its nuclear program. Trump withdrew the United States from the deal with Iran in May 2018. "Our inspectors have had access to all the sites and locations in Iran which they needed to visit," Amano said.

(Cover: Yukiya Amano, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, March 5, 2018. /VCG Photo)

Source(s): Reuters