In the early 1990s, North Korea's progress in missile and plutonium development led to an international diplomatic push to control their weapons technology. In 1991, following the removal of U.S. nuclear weapons from the South, North and South Korea signed a Non-Aggression Pact and the Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The Declaration banned nuclear weapons in both nations and called for inspections to verify denuclearization. In January 1992, North Korea, fulfilling an obligation under the NPT, signed a nuclear safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency, allowing inspections.
Diplomacy soon faltered. After a few inspections, North Korea refused to allow the inspectors access to certain facilities. In early 1993, North Korea threatened to withdraw from the NPT. 13 That year, the CIA first reported that the North might have enough plutonium for one or two nuclear weapons. 14
In 1994, the administration of President Bill Clinton had begun preparations for military action against North Korea when former President Jimmy Carter traveled to North Korea in June and extracted a promise from Kim Jong Il to freeze nuclear production. 1 The Agreed Framework was signed on Oct. 21, 1994.
Under the Agreed Framework, North Korea agreed to halt activities at its plutonium producing nuclear reactors in Pyongyang in exchange for a relaxation of economic sanctions, a gradual move toward normalization of diplomatic relations, fuel oil deliveries, and construction of a light-water reactor to replace the graphite-moderated reactor shut down at Pyongyang. Plutonium from light water reactors is harder to use for nuclear weapons than the plutonium procured by graphite-moderated reactors. 16 IAEA inspectors monitored North Korea's compliance. Upon completion of the light-water reactors, originally scheduled for 2003 but subsequently indefinitely delayed, North Korea was to dismantle its graphite reactors and ship its 8,000 remaining fuel rods out of the country. 17
Shortly after signing the agreement, North Korea began seeking nuclear weapons fuel through uranium enrichment. In the late 1990s, the United States began to receive scattered intelligence reports revealing a North Korean uranium enrichment program. Some evidence points to the existence of this program as early as 1987. 18 This program apparently received new life in 1997 when Pakistan, strapped for cash by U.S. sanctions, began paying for its North Korean missile imports with uranium enrichment technology.
An unclassified CIA report from early 2002 reported that "[North Korea] has been seeking centrifuge-related materials in large quantities to support a uranium enrichment program. It also obtained equipment suitable for use in uranium feed and withdrawal systems." 19 Last January, U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton accused North Korea of continuing its nuclear weapons program, and in February members of Congress expressed concern to the president about North Korea's uranium enrichment program. 20 According to the New Yorker Magazine, the CIA delivered a secret report to top Bush administration officials in June, which found that Pakistan had provided centrifuge technology to North Korea. 21 Centrifuges are essential in enriching uranium. A.Q. Khan, known as the father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb, has reportedly visited North Korea frequently in the last decade. 22 U.S. intelligence apparently found definitive evidence of North Korea's uranium program by tracing an attempt to purchase a large amount of high-strength uranium, a substance essential to equipment used to enrich uranium, to North Korea. Some North uranium enrichment facilities are likely located in the Hagap region, near the Chinese border. 23
The Yongbyon facility today houses 3,000 scientists and researchers, many of whom studied nuclear technology in the Soviet Union, China and Pakistan. The military runs the nuclear weapons program along with the intelligence service — under the direct supervision of President Kim Jong-Il.