Cooling-Off Period

By Bruce W. Nelan

As big-money deals go, Wall Street surely would pass, but not Washington: North Korea's nuclear program, which may have produced one or two atom bombs already, seems to be for sale. If it is, the asking price will be more than $1 billion -- the lowest estimate of what it would cost to dismantle Pyongyang's existing atomic reactor and replace it with a modern, less dangerous one. While the deal has not been completed, its essential outline emerged last week as U.S. and North Korean diplomats spent three days haggling over details in Geneva.

In the early-morning hours Saturday they issued a joint statement that cools off months of confrontation by promising future cooperation on several nuclear issues -- if the North Koreans are serious this time. Pyongyang says it will at last live up to its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and its long-ignored agreement to denuclearize the Korean peninsula. The U.S. agrees to an exchange of diplomatic liaison offices, leading toward full normalization of relations -- if all goes well. Washington also offers "assurances against the threat or use of nuclear weapons" against North Korea.

The statement represents "very significant" progress, said an Administration official in Washington. Robert Gallucci, the chief U.S. negotiator in Geneva, called it a first step that could lead to others, "and there are a bunch of those to be taken." The Geneva talks were the latest chapter in the frustrating, 14-month negotiation aimed at maneuvering the North Koreans into complying with the nonproliferation treaty, which they have defied by refusing to allow international inspections of their nuclear facilities -- and most likely by secretly building nuclear warheads. As Pyongyang views the protracted bargaining, the objective is a "broad and thorough" settlement in which the strapped pariah state reaps rich economic aid and diplomatic recognition. What the U.S. must figure out now is whether North Korea, under the possibly shaky direction of its new leader Kim Jong Il, is really ready to auction off its nascent nuclear arsenal.

At last week's meetings, Korean negotiator Kang Sok Ju recycled a proposal the late Kim Il Sung put forward a year ago: Pyongyang would scrap its graphite-moderated reactor, which produces readily obtained weapons-grade plutonium, if the U.S. would arrange to replace it with a highly efficient, light-water reactor, from which it is very difficult to extract plutonium. The Koreans would also freeze construction on two larger models. Washington agreed, but pointed out that it would be a long-term project, taking eight or 10 years to complete -- and that several issues need to be resolved now.

Leading that list are the 8,000 spent fuel rods the North Koreans abruptly pulled out of their reactor last May and June, inciting suspicions that Pyongyang was determined to expand its nuclear arsenal. Right now the rods are cooling in water-filled ponds at the Yongbyon nuclear center. If they are reprocessed they will yield enough plutonium for five bombs, which the U.S. is determined to keep the North Koreans from acquiring. The Koreans began the week warning that the rods must be reprocessed soon to avoid radioactive leakage. "We do not want this fuel reprocessed in North Korea," a State Department spokesman insisted. Washington suggested either blending a chemical mix into the cooling ponds to stabilize the rods for about a year or sending them to a third country for processing. The rods will stay at home, the North Koreans replied, but the water-treatment idea, or perhaps sealing the rods in concrete, might be possible. The sides did not manage to resolve this urgent issue last week, though Kang told reporters that North Korea would take steps to "stabilize" the rods and would not reprocess them for now.

The U.S., says Gallucci, will consider providing a new reactor only as part of an "overall settlement" that must include regular, full inspection of all North Korean nuclear areas, including those it is trying to keep secret -- a proviso the Koreans have not yet accepted. The North must also come up with a reliable answer to the question of how much plutonium it stockpiled after shutting down its reactor for 100 days in 1989. If all those conditions are met, Gallucci said, he was confident the U.S. could organize an international consortium to provide the light-water technology.

South Koreans generally favor the reactor swap. "We want to participate positively in this plan, financially and with technological cooperation," says a spokesman for President Kim Young Sam. One reason: Seoul assumes the two Koreas will reunite eventually and the South will end up financing the North's modernization.

Another round of negotiations will begin Sept. 23. Since there is more than a hint of extortion in Pyongyang's demand for a new reactor, Washington will have to reassure doubters that organizing a multinational payoff would set a good precedent. On the one hand, buying out Pyongyang might tempt other rogue states to withdraw from the nonproliferation treaty and seek rewards for rejoining it. On the other, replacing the North Korean reactor would be a reliable way to rule out a bomb program, because the North Koreans lack the complex facilities to harvest plutonium from a light-water reactor. The deal ; still might not stick: with such intense distrust on both sides, it would be a daunting task to abide by the specific terms of a decade-long contract.

With reporting by Robert Guest/Seoul and Jay Peterzell/Washington