Agence France-Presse, Tokyo,
7 January 2005

UN atomic chief proposes global freeze on nuclear cycle

UN atomic energy chief Mohamed ElBaradei has proposed that all countries lead by example by committing not to build facilities for uranium enrichment and nuclear reprocessing for five years.

Iran has agreed to suspend uranium enrichment temporarily in a deal with the European Union, while North Korea is refusing to return to talks over US allegations the communist state enriched uranium to build nuclear weapons.

ElBaradei told the Asahi Shimbun in Friday`s edition that a global freeze on construction for uranium enrichment and nuclear reprocessing would be discussed at a May conference in New York on the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.

Such a moratorium would have value as it would place "some limitation on the right of every country to develop a full (nuclear) fuel cycle," he said.

He said a global freeze could last for five years or "until we have completed our work on how we can have an international arrangement for the fuel cycle.

"We have enough capacity in the world for enrichment or reprocessing," said ElBaradei who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

"We should not forget the commitment by the weapons states to move toward nuclear disarmament," he said.

ElBaradei said revisions to the world`s nuclear framework had become more urgent after the admission last year by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the now disgraced father of Pakistan`s atomic bomb, of transfers in nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

The Asahi Shimbun said ElBaradei did not discuss how such a global freeze would affect Japan`s controversial tests on depleted uranium which began last month in the northern town of Rokkasho-mura as part of efforts to re-use spent nuclear fuel.