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North Korea has recently tested devices used to trigger atomic explosives 70 times, according to the country neighbor South Korea.And the country has confirmed that the North has reprocessed some of its 8,000 spent Nuclear Fuel Rods.Since April, North Korea had claimed that it had all but finished reprocessing the 8,000 rods, but until now both US and South Korean officials have doubted the claim.Expert say that if the rods were reprocessed they could yield enough plutoninum for several atomic bombs 'within months.'The South's Intelligence Agency said that the devices were tested at Yongduk-dong, some 25 miles northwest of Yongbyon,...

N Korea nuclear claim 'hushed up' By David Rennie in Washington and Hannah Cleaver in Berlin (Filed: 28/04/2003) A "poisonous" row is brewing in Washington over allegations that diplomats knew for weeks that North Korea claimed to be reprocessing nuclear fuel rods but hushed the matter up for fear of derailing peace talks. The world first knew of North Korean claims to be processing weapons-grade plutonium 10 days ago when the isolated Stalinist regime issued a statement saying it had told America in March about the reprocessing. That statement was initially dismissed as an error. But angry American officials told...

Hungary's only nuclear reactor at Paks, has been leaking radioactive gas since April 10, claim "no damage to the environment", as a result of an incident rated level 3, highest, before it is classified an accident. 30 fuel rods were seriously damaged. The damage was traced back to cooling insufficiency, malfunctioning of cooling equipment made by French-German company. This info is in two separate articles, but above was the summary. Here are the two articles, both by Reuters: ============= BUDAPEST, April 18 (Reuters) - Hungary's only nuclear plant said on Friday traces of radioactive gas had leaked into the atmosphere...

American Spy Satellites over North Korea have detected what appear to be trucks moving the country's stockpile of 8,000 nuclear fuel rods out of storage, prompting fears within the Bush administration that North Korea is preparing to produce roughly a half dozen nuclear weapons, American officials said today.Throughout January, intelligence analyists have seen extensive activity at the Yongbyon nuclear complex, with some trucks pulling up to the building housing the storage pond.While the satellites could not see exactly what was being put into the trucks, analysts concluded that it was likely the workers were transporting the rods to another site,...

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his associates in the political-security leadership promise that the American offensive against Iraq will solve Israel's problems. Hostile regimes in the region will collapse, Yasser Arafat will be replaced by a more palatable leadership and dollars from the United States will end the economic crisis. If we wait for the "day after," Sharon believes, we will awaken to a new reality, one in which the Arabs fear Israel's American-backed power. Waiting, however, comes with a price. The lengthy preparations for the war on Iraq suggest that even the world's superpower finds it hard to chew...