AFP
Thursday, December 21, 2006

Suspicious activities have been detected in a remote area of North Korea where the communist state carried out its first nuclear test in October, a South Korean lawmaker said Thursday.

"Since the beginning of this month, there has been very hectic activity at a tunnel near Mount Mantap in Punggyeri," Chung Hyung-Keun, an opposition Grand National Party lawmaker, told a meeting of top party officials.

Punggyeri, 350 kilometers (219 miles) northeast of Pyongyang, is the area where the first nuclear test was carried out.

"Engineering works have been underway on a large scale there. Western intelligence authorities regard it as a possible site for a second nuclear test," Chung was quoted as saying by Yonhap news agency.

The first test is believed to have been carried out in one of two horizontal tunnels dug into hills there.

The lawmaker, who serves on parliament's intelligence committee, was not quoted as giving the source for his information. The National Intelligence Service could not immediately be reached for comment.

South Korea's new defence minister Kim Jang-Soo warned last week that North Korea might stage a second nuclear weapons test to strengthen its hand in negotiations on scrapping its nuclear programmes, which began Monday in Beijing.

Chung noted that North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il had told China that he had no plans for a second test but that increased international pressure could trigger "further measures".

"According to intelligence authorities, North Korea may carry out a second test on a large scale if the ongoing negotiations do not move forward," Chung said.

North Korea apparently feels the first test strengthened its bargaining position and twice declined US requests for meetings before the six-party disarmament talks resumed, he said.

"The prospect for the six-party talks is rather bleak as North Korea is now demanding more, such as talks on nuclear arms reduction," he said.

When the talks resumed Monday North Korea reportedly said it would only consider scrapping its nuclear weapons when all international sanctions against it are lifted.

It also repeated long-held demands for help in developing a civilian nuclear power industry.

"Their position was that they would not care whether others recognize them as a nuclear power or not. They said they were satisfied with the possession of nuclear weapons," a South Korean official told reporters.

The United States, South Korea, Japan and Russia refuse to accept the North as a nuclear-armed state at the talks hosted by China.

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