"Without access to the secretive facility, it is difficult to say with certainty that the reactor has restarted, but the reactor can be used to generate electricity."
But the war-promoting AmeriKan pre$$ will ignore that.
"The analysis, made available Monday, comes after experts have reported other signs that North Korea is activating or expanding its nuclear production facilities. Findings will be presented Wednesday at a conference in Seoul. Pollack said he and Kemp analyzed such open-source data as scientific journals, news reports, and propaganda from North Korea. How to ensure North Korea does not lie about its nuclear program was a central dispute behind the collapse of talks."
I'm not worried about the Koreans lying!
About those collapsing talks:
"The first vice foreign minister of North Korea, Kim Kye-gwan, said North Korea is ready to talk without conditions, a standard phrase from North Korea for some time now. But the Obama administration has said it sees no sign that the North Korean government is serious about reducing its nuclear program, saying it appears to be increasing its nuclear activities."
Even as they halt upgrades at rocket launch sites.
Related: North Korea military parades through Pyongyang
Obama could speak at the Korean Memorial because it was before the shutdown and inconveniencing of veterans for political purposes.
"Nuclear experts in the United States, including at the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University, reported last month that satellite photographs indicated that North Korea had restarted the
5-megawatt reactor at its main nuclear complex in Yongbyon, north of Pyongyang, the capital."
Could be for energy to power the factories of foreign investors:
"North Korea plans to expand special economic zones" Associated Press, October 17, 2013
PYONGYANG, North Korea — In a bid to bolster its laggard economy, North Korea plans to set up more special economic zones and has created a group to assist potential foreign investors, state media and the organizers of a rare international conference in Pyongyang said Wednesday.
Ri Chol Sok, vice president of the newly formed Korea Economic Development Association, which is hosting the two-day conference, said the zones ‘‘are already starting to be organized all over the country.’’
The meeting began Wednesday with academics and experts from 13 countries — including the United States, Canada, India, China, Malaysia, and Vietnam — and 60 North Korean participants.
North Korea is still regarded as too risky by many businesses but has had its eye on expanding its use of economic zones since at least June, when it announced foreign investors would be given preferential treatment for land use, labor, and taxes.
North Korea, which is one of the world’s poorest countries, officially follows a rigid planned economy, but authorities have tolerated unofficial capitalist activities for years. It has experimented with special economic zones as a means of enticing foreign investment since the 1990s.
At times it has raised hell with North Korea's currency value and they had to back off.
The longest-running example is the Rason Special Economic Zone, in the far northeast of the country. It was set up in the early 1990s, but made little progress until recently after being reinvented as a joint North Korea-China project. Another North Korea-China joint economic development project on the border between the two countries at Hwanggumpyong is still at a much earlier stage of development.
North Korea also has a joint industrial zone with South Korea, at Kaesong, but that was shut for months this year after North Korea pulled its workers out during a period of heightened tension between Pyongyang and Seoul.
The two Koreas have agreed to reopen Kaesong, but it has not returned to full operations and tensions remain. North Korea abruptly called off reunions for war-separated families last month and South Korea postponed an information session aimed at introducing the Kaesong complex to foreign investors.
Related:
"Hopes for improved ties began to rise in recent weeks, as the rival governments de-escalated their confrontational rhetoric of earlier this year and tensions appeared to ease. North Korea has been calling for inter-Korean reconciliation, proposing talks to revive a number of joint projects suspended in recent years, including South Korean tours to Diamond Mountain, a scenic destination that was visited by nearly 2 million South Koreans from 1998 to 2008, when a jointly operated tour program was suspended. But South Korean officials remain wary of the North’s motives."
Also see:
2 Koreas agree to discuss reunions for families
Signaling thaw, North Korea to open plant run by South
Jointly run industrial park in N. Korea operating again
N. Korea criticizes S. Korea-U.S. drills in milder tone
It all looks good to me!
Many analysts say North Korea takes Kaesong’s resumption and the new zones seriously because it believes they could help draw outside investment and revive its struggling economy, one of leader Kim Jong Un’s top stated goals.
Doubts remain over whether foreign investors will be willing to take the risk of operating in the North.
While Pyongyang has shown new signs of trying to reform its economy over the past year and a half, it has also continued to maintain state control. Instead of ‘‘reform’’ or ‘‘change,’’ North Korea referred to the free market style changes last year as ‘‘new economic management methods.’’
The foreign co-organizer of the conference, Park Kyung-ae, from the University of British Columbia in Canada, said she hopes to continue such exchanges with more conferences abroad.
No reason not to!
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But you gotta watch Kim because he is tightening his grip on power.
Also see:
UN seeking $98m for N. Korea aid
Remains of Korean War casualty come home to Leominster
Time to say bae-bae to the North.
"South Korean president, Park Geun-hye, beginning a fixed five-year term, took office in February looking for a middle ground between unrequited friendship of liberal presidents and the hard line of predecessor Lee Myng-bak. During her trip to Washington in May, Park told Congress that she wanted to build trust with the North through exchanges and cooperation, leading the way to a peaceful reunification. ‘‘But as we say in Korea, it takes two hands to clap,’’ she said. ‘‘Trust is not something that can be imposed on another.’’
Park’s strategy has proven popular; her approval rating is near 60 percent.
Amazing how PEACE is ALWAYS POPULAR!
She is also calculating, analysts say, that the North feels increasing pressure to improve ties with the South. Aid and trade would help the North’s decrepit state-run economy while also counterbalancing its heavy reliance on China. Tellingly, North Korean state media has made only a few nasty quips about Park — a change from Lee, who was pilloried almost daily.
Pushing Park away at this stage would mean ‘‘the continuation of another four-plus years of a cold shoulder,’’ said Scott Snyder, senior fellow for Korea studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. ‘‘Frankly, given North Korea’s tangible [economic] circumstances, to shut that door would [mean] some significant consequences.’’
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I like a breakthrough that is a significant gain and a fresh start for peace.
Related: South Korea OK’s $7m in aid for North
I also saw something about their being an attempted coup, arrests for treason, and corruption, but I don't want anything to ruin the happy feeling I have regarding the positive movements toward peace on the Korean peninsula.
