U.S. offers evidence of North Korea-Syria nuclear plant

U.S. intelligence officials showed satellite images, classified photos and other evidence to members of Congress today in an unusual presentation intended to advance the American case that North Korea was helping Syria build a nuclear reactor before the facility was destroyed by Israeli warplanes last year.

CIA Director Michael V. Hayden and senior spy officials spent hours briefing key committees on Capitol Hill, publicly releasing much of the evidence later in the afternoon.

In detailing the alleged North Korean-Syrian cooperation and the destruction of the plant, the Bush administration broke a long silence on the issue, finally confirming the Israeli attack but denying U.S. involvement in its planning or execution.

As the briefings began, the White House in a statement strongly condemned both North Korea and Syria for their alleged roles in the project. Syria responded by denouncing “false allegations that the current United States administration continually launches against Syria.”

The evidence includes photos of Asian workers at a facility in a remote area of Syria, where intelligence agencies had for years tracked construction of a plant they said bore remarkable similarities to a nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, North Korea.

“There are images from within the facility,” said a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the material. “But the key here is not that image, but the design features and components similarities between this facility and Yongbyon. And the fact that there has been for about a decade now a relationship in the nuclear sphere between Syria and North Korea.”

The closed-door presentations on Capitol Hill created the exceedingly unusual spectacle of American spy agencies going public with elements of their otherwise classified case against North Korea, which the U.S. accuses of spreading nuclear weapons technology around the globe.

Administration officials said they were releasing the information to buttress the U.S. bargaining position in talks with North Korea that are aimed at removing nuclear weapons under the communist nation’s control.

Administration officials also hope to pressure Syria and Iran. They accuse Syria of supporting terrorism and destabilizing Lebanon, and they hope today’s disclosures will show Iran that covert nuclear facilities can be detected and exposed.

The briefings centered on a video assembled by American spy agencies that includes images and other evidence linking North Korea to the nascent reactor at a site known as Al Kibar, about 90 miles from the border with Iraq.

The facility was destroyed in a secret strike Sept. 6 by Israeli warplanes, an operation the United States did not condemn and one Israeli officials have been silent about. U.S. officials said the facility was destroyed before it was loaded with nuclear fuel or became operational.

The White House statement said U.S. officials were convinced by a variety of information, including that the facility “was not intended for peaceful purposes. Carefully hidden from view, the reactor was not configured for such purposes.”

The statement called North Korea’s alleged secret cooperation with Syria a “dangerous manifestation” of Pyongyang’s nuclear proliferation activities, which have long been a concern to the United States.

It demanded that the Syrian regime “come clean before the world regarding its illicit activities. The Syrian regime supports terrorism, takes action that destabilizes Lebanon, allows the transit of some foreign fighters into Iraq and represses its own people.”

Syria should end these activities if “it wants better relations with the international community,” the statement says.

The decision to release the intelligence after months of restricting it to a small circle of White House and congressional officials prompted speculation about the administration’s motives.

Some observers – including some within the administration – theorized that the briefings were scheduled because administration hawks believed the disclosure would galvanize congressional opposition to U.S. talks with North Korea or cause angry North Koreans to break off negotiations.

Administration officials denied such a motive, saying they needed to release the information to win congressional assent and funding approval for the negotiations.

Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, emerged from one of today’s briefings saying that many lawmakers believed “that we were used today by the administration” and that the White House shared the data not out of a desire to keep Congress informed but “because they had other agendas in mind.”

A U.S. official acknowledged that the negotiations with North Korea “could hit a bump over this” but indicated that it was necessary to keep lawmakers informed because of possible pending progress in those talks.

“As you move forward, you need to say what you know,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity when discussing the strategy behind the disclosures.

Syrian officials have steadfastly denied that the facility was a nuclear reactor, and they likened the U.S. decision to release the evidence to the now notorious presentations by U.S. officials that preceded the war in Iraq.

International officials have also voiced skepticism. A diplomat in Vienna close to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. watchdog group, said the agency “asked for evidence but was not given any.”

The official also noted that Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, said in October that countries claiming to have evidence of illicit nuclear activity “should bring it forward, not bomb first and ask questions later.”

A senior European diplomat sought to play down the importance of the disclosures, saying Western intelligence services compared notes some months ago and concluded that the site was a nuclear facility built with North Korean help.

“This is already known by all the countries that have an interest in the area,” said the official, who spoke anonymously because of the sensitivity of the issue.

He predicted the disclosure would not disrupt international talks aiming to remove nuclear weapons from North Korea, nor have major fallout for Syria or Israel.

He said U.S. officials have told their foreign counterparts that their motive in holding the briefing now was simply to satisfy congressional demands for the information.

Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, condemned North Korea but did call for an end to the denuclearization talks.

He said in a statement that the disclosure was “very troubling but not surprising.” He said any deal with North Korea should be “fully verifiable,” and that Pyongyang’s human rights conduct should be made part of the negotiation.

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the disclosures showed the need to verify North Korea’s claims, but also to press ahead with the negotiations.

“Some will argue that North Korea’s assistance to Syria is cause to end the six-party talks for the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula,” Biden said in a statement. “To the contrary, it underscores the need for pursuing the talks, which remain our best chance to convince North Korea to abandon its pursuit of nuclear weapons and to stop proliferation.”

Jon Wolfsthal, a former government nuclear arms specialist now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the “novel” deal worked out by U.S. officials and North Koreans regarding denuclearization has “been met with skepticism both on the Hill and in policy circles.” He said that if there is convincing evidence that North Korea helped Syria on a nuclear reactor, it would “only add to concern that the agreement being negotiated be both comprehensive and verifiable.”

There was no immediate reaction from North Korea. KCNA, the official news agency, released a statement earlier in the day that negotiations between the two sides were going well.

paul.richter@latimes.com

greg.miller@latimes.com

Times staff writer Maggie Farley at the United Nations contributed to this report.