TIMELINE: North Korea's nuclear history
Monday, December 23, 2002 Posted: 12:46 PM HKT (0446 GMT)
North Korea says it has begun removing UN monitoring equipment from one of its nuclear reactors
SEOUL, South Korea (Reuters) -- The following is a chronology of key events in the past 17 years of diplomatic efforts to contain North Korea's atomic ambitions:
December 1985: North Korea joins the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), but makes adherence to safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) contingent on removal of U.S. nuclear weapons from South Korea.
September 1991: President George Bush announces withdrawal of all U.S. tactical nuclear weapons deployed abroad, including about 100 based in South Korea.
December 1991: The two Koreas sign the South-North Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. They pledge not to test, produce, receive, store, deploy or use nuclear weapons. They also agree to mutual inspections.
January 1992: North Korea concludes a comprehensive safeguards agreement with the IAEA, ratifying agreement in April.
May 1992: North Korea declares seven sites and some plutonium to be subject to IAEA inspection.
September 1992: IAEA inspectors discover discrepancies in North Korea's initial report on its nuclear programme and ask for clarification on the amount of reprocessed plutonium.
February 1993: The IAEA demands special inspections of two nuclear waste storage sites, citing evidence that North Korea had been cheating on its NPT commitments. North Korea refuses.
March 1993: Facing demands for special inspections, North Korea announces its intention to withdraw from the NPT three months later, citing national security considerations.
April 1993: The IAEA declares that North Korea is not adhering to its safeguards agreement.
June 1993: Following talks with the United States, North Korea suspends its decision to pull out of the NPT and agrees to accept IAEA safeguards.
January 1994: The director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) estimates that North Korea may have produced one or two nuclear weapons.
March 1994: IAEA inspectors arrive in North Korea for the first inspections in a year. North Korea's refusal to allow inspections of a plutonium reprocessing plant at Yongbyon, north of Pyongyang, prompts the IAEA to pass a resolution calling on North Korea to allow immediately all requested inspections.
May 1994: North Korea begins removing spent fuel from a 5-megawatt research reactor without international monitoring.
June 1994: North Korea announces its withdrawal from the IAEA. Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter negotiates a deal with North Korea in which it confirms its willingness to freeze its nuclear arms programme and resume talks with the United States.
October 1994: The United States and North Korea conclude four months of negotiations by adopting the Agreed Framework in Geneva. The agreement calls for North Korea to freeze and eventually eliminate its nuclear facilities and to allow IAEA special inspections. In exchange, Pyongyang is to receive two light-water reactors (LWRs) and annual shipments of heavy fuel oil, financed and built through the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO), a multinational consortium.
March 1995: KEDO is formed in New York with the United States, South Korea and Japan as original members.
December 1998: The United States and North Korea hold talks to address U.S. concerns about a suspected underground nuclear facility at Kumchang-ni, northeast of the capital.
A satellite photo shows North Korea's nuclear facility at Yongbyong
May 1999: In exchange for food aid, North Korea allows a U.S. inspection team to visit the Kumchang-ni site. The team finds no evidence of nuclear activity.
November 1999: KEDO officials sign contract with the Korea Electric Power Corporation to begin construction of the two LWRs in Kumho, North Korea.
January 2002: President George W. Bush says North Korea, Iran and Iraq form an "axis of evil" threatening the world with weapons of mass destruction. North Korea says the remarks amount to a declaration of war.
April 2002: Bush issues a memorandum stating that he will not certify North Korea's compliance with the Agreed Framework. However he allows continued U.S. funding of oil shipments.
August 2002: KEDO holds a ceremony to mark the pouring of concrete foundations for the first LWR.
October 3-5, 2002: James Kelly, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, confronts Pyongyang with U.S. evidence of a covert uranium enrichment programme. North Korea responds by saying it is "entitled to possess not only nuclear weapons but other types of weapons more powerful than them in defense of its sovereignty in face of the U.S. threat."
October 16, 2002: The United States announces that North Korea admitted during Kelly's visit to having a covert programme to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.
October 25, 2002: North Korea's Foreign Ministry says it will address U.S. concerns about its nuclear programme if the United States signs a non-aggression treaty, guarantees Pyongyang's sovereignty and pledges not to interfere in its economic development.
North Korea admitted to the U.S. to having a covert programme to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons
November 14, 2002: The United States and its allies hold a KEDO meeting in New York and decide to cut off fuel oil shipments to North Korea, beginning in December.
November 29, 2002: The IAEA calls on North Korea to open its atomic weapons programme to inspections, says it "deplored" Pyongyang's assertion it had a right to possess the weapons.
December 4, 2002: North Korea rejects the IAEA call to open its weapons programme to inspections, saying the U.N. nuclear watchdog was abetting U.S. policy toward the North.
December 21, 2002: The IAEA says North Korea has disabled surveillance devices the agency had placed at the five-megawatt Yongbyon research reactor.
December 22, 2002: North Korea says it has begun removing IAEA monitoring equipment from Yongbyon, drawing condemnation from the United States, South Korea, Japan and France.
(Sources: Arms Control Association, U.S. State Department, Korean Central News Agency)
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