February 9, 2008; Page A8 'While Pyongyang denies a program for uranium enrichment, and they deny their proliferation activities, we believe North Korea continues to engage in both." So said Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell in his statement to the Senate Intelligence Committee this week.
The statement didn't get much attention, but it should because it contradicts the impression presented elsewhere in the Bush Administration that North Korea has given up its nuclear plans. About a year ago, an intelligence official named Joseph DeTrani made headlines when he told the Senate that the U.S. intelligence community had modified its assessment about the existence of North Korea's uranium-enrichment program from a high- to mid-confidence level. Pyongyang's 2002 admission -- later retracted -- that it had pursued uranium enrichment in addition to the plutonium-based program through which it developed its current arsenal, led the Bush Administration to suspend the assistance it had been providing the North under the 1994 "Agreed Framework." Mr. DeTrani's testimony was seized upon last year by those favoring a second nuclear deal with the North, which President Bush has embraced and promoted.
A year later, however, U.S. spooks confirm that, far from honoring his pledge to disarm, Kim Jong Il is both continuing to proliferate WMD material and is continuing work on uranium enrichment. Some second deal.
