Washington, July 16: The United States is checking claims Pyongyang has enough plutonium to make half a dozen nuclear bombs, as it fends off criticism its North Korean policy is ineffective. North Korean officials told the U.S. State Department last week they had completed reprocessing 8,000 spent fuel rods from a nuclear plant into plutonium.

US officials have said such claims are "serious" as Pyongyang has already made it clear it intends to make nuclear weapons.

While the Bush administration says it is evaluating the claims, one US official involved in North Korea policy said "we have hard scientific data and evidence" to support the assessment that the North has begun reprocessing.

North Korea and the United States have been in a standoff since October when Washington said Pyongyang admitted to having a covert nuclear weapons program -- in violation of a 1994 pact.

But there is a clear view among some in Washington that North Korea is upping the ante to gain bargaining power to get what it wants: a non-aggression pact with the United States, as well as more oil and food aid.

"We seek a diplomatic solution, but as we move forward we will remain in close contact with South Korea, Japan, China and others to address this and find a solution," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters Tuesday.
But some US national security experts believe the diplomatic solution is a failure.

The most prominent among them is former defense secretary William Perry, who told The Washington Post he thinks North Korea and the United States may be heading toward war.

Perry told the Post in an interview published Tuesday that after speaking to several senior administration officials he is baffled by Bush's policy on North Korea.
"I'm damned if I can figure out what the policy is," he said. "My theory is the reason we don't have a policy on this, and we aren't negotiating, is the president himself." "I think he has come to the conclusion that Kim Jong Il is evil and loathsome and it is immoral to negotiate with him," Perry told the Post.

North Korea's claim about the fuel rods is particularly troublesome, said Perry, who as President Clinton's defense secretary directed preparations for possible airstrikes against North Korean nuclear plants in 1994.

Bureau Report