N Korea pilfering N-reactor site

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SEOUL, Dec 30 (Reuters): North Korea has been taking equipment left at a nuclear reactor site that was mothballed when an international consortium halted work on grounds the communist state was breaking an agreement, a news report said Wednesday.
If the report is true, the looting would be in defiance of a deal the North reached in the 1990s with regional powers and could cloud a recent push to restart international disarmament-for-aid discussions.
Billions of dollars were poured into the project to build two relatively proliferation-resistant light water reactors for the North in return for a promise to freeze its nuclear plant that produces arms-grade plutonium. The deal was halted in 2002 with a third of the work finished.
North Korea may have used some of the more than 200 pieces of heavy equipment taken from the site in the country's northeast to stage a nuclear test in May, South Korea's JoongAng Ilbo newspaper said, quoting government officials.
"The removal of equipment without taking steps to settle financial issues is a clear violation of the agreement and can be construed as theft," one official was quoted as saying.