South Korea Said Weighing Prolonging Nuclear Trade Deal With U.S.

South Korea Said Weighing Prolonging Nuclear Trade Deal With U.S.

South Korea is contemplating prolonging its soon-to-expire nuclear trade accord with the United States as the two sides are still seriously divided over the terms of a replacement accord, the Korea Herald reported on Sunday.
In negotiations to replace the 1974 trade deal that expires next March, Seoul is pushing for the right to domestically reprocess used nuclear fuel and enrich uranium -- technologies it argues are necessary for the healthy growth of an expanding atomic energy sector but that can also be exploited to create fissile material. While there is little worry of South Korea covertly creating a nuclear weapons program, there are concerns Washington would set a bad proliferation standard by allowing enrichment and reprocessing in the South.http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/south-korea-considering-prolonging-nuclear-trade-deal-us/