headed for North KoreaJanuary 14, 1995
Web posted at: 2:58 p.m. EST (1958 GMT)
From Correspondent Sohn Jie-Ae
PUSAN, South Korea (CNN) -- The first shipload of equipment to build two light-water nuclear reactors in North Korea left the South Korean port of Pusan on Sunday.
Large drilling machines, a mud pump and other equipment needed for a geological survey were loaded into containers on board a Chinese-flagged ship (255K QuickTime movie). The 1,042-ton freighter was expected to arrive in a North Korean port around January 16. The machinery will then be transported to the northeastern coast city of Shinpo, the site chosen for the two power plants.
The equipment is part of a $4.5 billion deal signed in Geneva in 1994 between North Korea and an international consortium. In the agreement, the United States promised to build the reactors. In return, North Korea agreed to scrap its older graphite reactors and eventually dismantle its nuclear weapons program.
Despite its repeated denials, the communist North is suspected of having stockpiled enough weapons-grade plutonium to make at least one nuclear bomb.
The two modern light-water reactors will produce far less weapons-grade material than North Korea's existing Soviet-designed system, according to the agreement.
A 20-member team geological survey team from the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) left Seoul Sunday for Shinpo. KEDO is the international consortium that is overseeing the project. The delegation of 18 South Koreans, an American and a Japanese nuclear expert will arrive January 17 via Beijing for a month of geological and seismic surveys in the Shinpo area.
In Seoul, meanwhile, KEDO officials met to discuss cost-sharing arrangements for the nuclear project. U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Hubbard flew into Seoul on Saturday to meet his South Korean and Japanese counterparts. The officials are also discussing what role the European Union should play in implementing the deal.
South Korea has pledged to pay the bulk of the estimated $4.5 billion cost, while the United States is expected to keep up a steady supply of fuel oil for North Korea until the reactors are completed -- by the year 2004.
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AP and Reuters contributed to this report.
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