Tag Archives: Nuclear Weapons

North Korea’s Kim says country has miniaturized nuclear warheads

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said the country has miniaturized nuclear warheads to mount on ballistic missiles and ordered improvements in the power and precision of its arsenal, state media reported on Wednesday.

Kim has called for his military to be prepared to mount pre-emptive attacks against the United States and South Korea and stand ready to use nuclear weapons, stepping up belligerent rhetoric after coming under new U.N. and bilateral sanctions for its nuclear and rocket tests.

U.S. and South Korean troops began large-scale military drills this week, which the North called “nuclear war moves” and threatened to respond with an all-out offensive.

Kim’s comments, released on Wednesday, were his first direct mention of the claim, made repeatedly in state media, to have successfully miniaturized a nuclear warhead, which has been widely questioned and never independently verified.

“The nuclear warheads have been standardized to be fit for ballistic missiles by miniaturizing them,” KCNA quoted Kim as saying as he inspected the work of nuclear scientists, adding “this can be called a true nuclear deterrent”.

“He stressed the importance of building ever more powerful, precision and miniaturized nuclear weapons and their delivery means,” KCNA said.

Kim also inspected the nuclear warhead designed for thermo-nuclear reaction, KCNA said, referring to a miniaturized hydrogen bomb that the country said it tested on Jan. 6.

Rodong Sinmun, official daily of the North’s ruling party, carried pictures of Kim in what seemed to be a large hangar speaking to aides standing in front of a silver spherical object.

They also showed a large object similar to the KN-08 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) previously put on display at military parades, with Kim holding a half-smoked cigarette in one of the images.

South Korea’s defense ministry said after the release of the images that it did not believe the North has successfully miniaturized a nuclear warhead or deployed a functioning ICBM.

That assessment is in line with the views of South Korean and U.S. officials that the North has likely made some advances in trying to put a nuclear warhead on a missile, but that there is no proof it has mastered the technology.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, speaking by telephone to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, described the situation on the Korean peninsula as “very tense” and called for all parties be remain calm and exercise restraint, China’s foreign ministry said.

North Korea conducted its fourth nuclear test on Jan. 6 claiming to have set off a miniaturized hydrogen bomb, which was disputed by many experts and the governments of South Korea and the United States. The blast detected from the test was simply too small to back up the claim, experts said at the time.

The U.N. Security Council imposed harsh new sanctions on the isolated state last week for the nuclear test. It launched a long-range rocket in February drawing international criticism and sanctions from its rival, South Korea.

South Korea on Tuesday announced further measures aimed at isolating the North by blacklisting individuals and entities that it said were linked to Pyongyang’s weapons program.

China also stepped up pressure on the North by barring one of the 31 ships on its transport ministry’s blacklist.

But a U.N. panel set up to monitor sanctions under an earlier Security Council resolution adopted in 2009 said in a report released on Tuesday that it had “serious questions about the efficacy of the current U.N. sanctions regime.”

North Korea has been “effective in evading sanctions” by continuing to engage in banned trade, “facilitated by the low level of implementation of Security Council resolutions by Member States,” the Panel of Experts said.

“The reasons are diverse, but include lack of political will, inadequate enabling legislation, lack of understanding of the resolutions and low prioritization,” it said.

(Additional reporting by Ju-min Park and James Pearson in Seoul and Jessica Macy Yu in Beijing; Editing by Michael Perry and Nick Macfie)

U.S. takes North Korea nuclear threats seriously, State Department says

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. State Department said on Monday the United States took North Korean threats to use nuclear weapons seriously and urged Pyongyang to halt its provocations, including testing nuclear devices and long-range rockets.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his country last week to be prepared to use nuclear weapons at any time and to be ready to carry out a pre-emptive attack, state media reported.

His comments came as U.S. and South Korean forces conducted annual military exercises amid heightened tensions on the peninsula following the North’s recent nuclear and missile tests, which prompted the United Nations to impose new sanctions on Pyongyang.

“We certainly do take those kinds of threats seriously … and again call on Pyongyang to cease with the provocative rhetoric, cease with the threats and quite frankly, more critically, cease with the provocative behavior, the actual conduct, that has led to yet another round of international sanctions,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

(Reporting by Arshad Mohammed and David Alexander; Editing by Eric Beech)

South Korea, U.S. begin military exercises as North Korea threatens attack

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean and U.S. troops began large-scale military exercises on Monday in an annual test of their defenses against North Korea, which called the drills “nuclear war moves” and threatened to respond with an all-out offensive.

South Korea said the exercises would be the largest ever following North Korea’s fourth nuclear test in January and a long-range rocket launch last month that triggered a U.N. Security Council resolution and tough new sanctions.

Isolated North Korea has rejected criticism of is nuclear and rocket programs, even from old ally China, and last week leader Kim Jong Un ordered his country to be ready to use nuclear weapons in the face of what he sees as growing threats from enemies.

The joint U.S. and South Korean military command said it had notified North Korea of “the non-provocative nature of this training” involving about 17,000 American troops and more than 300,000 South Koreans.

South Korea’s Defence Ministry said it had seen no sign of any unusual military activity by the North.

North Korea’s National Defence Commission said the North Korean army and people would “realize the greatest desire of the Korean nation through a sacred war of justice for reunification”, in response to any attack by U.S. and South Korean forces.

“The army and people of the DPRK will launch an all-out offensive to decisively counter the U.S. and its followers’ hysterical nuclear war moves,” the North Korean commission said in a statement carried by the North’s KCNA news agency.

The North, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), as it is officially known, routinely issues threats of military action in response to the annual exercises that it sees as preparation for war against it.

The threat on Monday was in line with the usual rhetoric it uses to denounce the drills.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei noted that North Korea had already said it opposed the drills, adding that Beijing was “deeply concerned” about the exercises.

“China is linked to the Korean Peninsula. In terms of the peninsula’s security, China is deeply concerned and firmly opposed to any trouble-making behavior on the peninsula’s doorstep. We urge all sides to keep calm, exercise restraint and not escalate tensions,” he told a daily news briefing.

The latest U.N. sanctions imposed on North Korea were drafted by the United States and China as punishment for its nuclear test and satellite launch, which the United States and others say was really a test of ballistic missile technology.

South Korea’s spy agency said it would hold an emergency cyber-security meeting on Tuesday to check readiness against any threat of cyber attack from the North, after detecting evidence of attempts by the North to hack into South Korean mobile phones.

South Korea has been on heightened cyber alert since the nuclear test and the rocket launch.

South Korea and the U.S. militaries began talks on Friday on the deployment of an advanced anti-missile Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) system in South Korea.

(Reporting by Jack Kim and James Pearson; Additional reporting by Jessica Macy Yu in Beijing; Editing by Robert Birsel)

North Korea leader tells military to be ready to use nuclear weapons

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered his country to be ready to use its nuclear weapons at any time and the military to be in “pre-emptive attack” mode in the face of growing threats from its enemies, state media said on Friday.

The comments, carried by the North’s official KCNA news agency, marked a further escalation of tension on the Korean peninsula after the U.N. Security Council imposed harsh new sanctions on the isolated state for its nuclear program.

North Korea, known for belligerent rhetoric, has previously threatened pre-emptive attacks on its enemies, including South Korea and the United States. Military experts doubt it has yet developed the capability to fire a long-range missile with a miniaturized warhead to deliver a nuclear weapon as far as the United States.

Kim made the comments as he supervised military exercises involving newly developed rocket launchers, KCNA reported. It did not mention the date of the drills but said the new weapons had South Korea within range.

South Korea’s defence ministry said on Thursday the North launched several projectiles off its coast into the sea, up to 90 miles away, an apparent response to the U.N. sanctions.

Kim said North Korea should “bolster up (its) nuclear force both in quality and quantity” and stressed “the need to get the nuclear warheads deployed for national defence always on standby so as to be fired any moment,” KCNA quoted him as saying.

“Now is the time for us to convert our mode of military counteraction toward the enemies into a pre-emptive attack one in every aspect.”

Kim criticised South Korean President Park Geun-hye in his first direct published mention of her by name for acting “in league with the U.S. scoundrels,” adding, “her hysteria will precipitate only her ruin in the long run,” KCNA said.

A spokesman for South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which handles relations with the North, said Kim’s comments were not helpful and may have been intended for the domestic audience, to boost morale in the face of the new U.N. sanctions.

Responding to the report, a U.S. Defense Department spokesman, Commander Bill Urban, said, “We urge North Korea to refrain from provocative actions that aggravate tensions and instead focus on fulfilling its international obligations and commitments.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said that given the sensitive and complex situation on the Korean peninsula, China hoped the parties would maintain restraint, and “be careful in their words and actions, and not take any actions that would exacerbate tensions in this situation”.

The latest U.N. sanctions, drafted by the United States and China, the North’s main ally, punish the isolated country following its fourth nuclear test, in January, as well as last month’s satellite launch, which the United States and others say was really a test of ballistic missile technology.

Later on Friday, North Korea rejected the Security Council resolution as a “criminal act” masterminded by the United States and vowed to continue boosting its nuclear deterrent and move forward on the path to become a “satellite superpower”.

“Our response will involve the full use of various means and tools including a strong and ruthless physical response,” KCNA quoted an unnamed government spokesman as saying.

POSSIBLE ENGINE TEST EYED

South Korea and the U.S. militaries are set to formally begin talks on Friday on deployment of the advanced anti-missile Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) system with the U.S. military in the South.

China and Russia oppose the deployment of THAAD, which has powerful radar capable of penetrating deep into their countries, but South Korea and the United States have said it is needed in response to the heightened missile threat from the North.

Johns Hopkins University’s 38 North project, which monitors North Korea, said recent commercial satellite imagery showed new activity in the isolated country, including a convoy of trucks at its satellite launch station that could be preparations for a rocket-engine test.

The site on the North’s west coast is the upgraded rocket station where it launched a long-range rocket on Feb. 7 that put an object into space, but was condemned by the Security Council as violation of past resolutions that ban the use of ballistic missile technology by the North.

On Thursday, South Korean President Park repeated a warning to the North to abandon its nuclear ambitions and said she would work to “end tyranny” by its leader.

They were the toughest-ever comments against Pyongyang by Park, whose recent hard line against the North is a shift from her earlier policy of “trustpolitik” that focused on trying to engage in dialogue.

North Korea’s Rodong Sinmun, the official daily newspaper of the ruling Workers’ Party, on Friday carried three pages of a report and photographs of leader Kim supervising the rocket launch drills.

It also ran a full-page commentary insulting Park as “a wicked woman who does everything evil against the compatriots in the North.”

(Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington and Megha Rajagopalan in Beijing; Editing by Tony Munroe and Raju Gopalakrishnan)

U.S. test-fires ICBMs to stress its power to Russia, North Korea

VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. (Reuters) – The U.S. military test-fired its second intercontinental ballistic missile in a week on Thursday night, seeking to demonstrate its nuclear arms capacity at a time of rising strategic tensions with Russia and North Korea.

The unarmed Minuteman III missile roared out of a silo at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California late at night, raced across the sky at speeds of up to 15,000 mph and landed a half hour later in a target area 4,200 miles away near Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands of the South Pacific.

Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work, who witnessed the launch, said the U.S. tests, conducted at least 15 times since January 2011, send a message to strategic rivals like Russia, China and North Korea that Washington has an effective nuclear arsenal.

“That’s exactly why we do this,” Work told reporters before the launch.

“We and the Russians and the Chinese routinely do test shots to prove that the operational missiles that we have are reliable. And that is a signal … that we are prepared to use nuclear weapons in defense of our country if necessary.”

Demonstrating the reliability of the nuclear force has taken on additional importance recently because the U.S. arsenal is near the end of its useful life and a spate of scandals in the nuclear force two years ago raised readiness questions.

The Defense Department has poured millions of dollars into improving conditions for troops responsible for staffing and maintaining the nuclear systems. The administration also is putting more focus on upgrading the weapons.

President Barack Obama’s final defense budget unveiled this month calls for a $1.8 billion hike in nuclear arms spending to overhaul the country’s aging nuclear bombers, missiles, submarines and other systems.

The president’s $19 billion request would allow the Pentagon and Energy Department to move toward a multiyear overhaul of the atomic arms infrastructure that is expected to cost $320 billion over a decade and up to 1 trillion dollars over 30 years.

The nuclear spending boost is an ironic turn for a president who made reducing U.S. dependence on atomic weapons a centerpiece of his agenda during his first years in office.

Obama called for a world eventually free of nuclear arms in a speech in Prague and later reached a new strategic weapons treaty with Russia. He received the Nobel Peace Prize in part based on his stance on reducing atomic arms.

“He was going to de-emphasize the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. national security policy … but in fact in the last few years he has emphasized new spending,” said John Isaacs of the Council for a Livable World, an arms control advocacy group.

Critics say the Pentagon’s plans are unaffordable and unnecessary because it intends to build a force capable of deploying the 1,550 warheads permitted under the New START treaty. But Obama has said the country could further reduce its deployed warheads by a third and still remain secure.

Hans Kristensen, an analyst at the Federation of American Scientists, said the Pentagon’s costly “all-of-the-above” effort to rebuild all its nuclear systems was a “train wreck that everybody can see is coming.” Kingston Reif of the Arms Control Association, said the plans were “divorced from reality.”

The Pentagon could save billions by building a more modest force that would delay the new long-range bomber, cancel the new air launched cruise missile and construct fewer ballistic submarines, arms control advocates said.

Work said the Pentagon understood the financial problem. The department would need $18 billion a year between 2021 and 2035 for its portion of the nuclear modernization, which is coming at the same time as a huge “bow wave” of spending on conventional ships and aircraft, he said.

“If it becomes clear that it’s too expensive, then it’s going to be up to our national leaders to debate” the issue, Work said, something that could take place during the next administration when spending pressures can no longer be ignored.

(Reporting by David Alexander; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and John Stonestreet)

China urges North Korea, U.S. to hold direct talks

BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s foreign ministry on Monday urged the United States and North Korea to sit down with each other face-to-face and resolve their problems, as tension continues to climb on the Korean peninsula after North Korea’s latest rocket test.

While China was angered by the launch, it has also expressed concern at plans by Washington and Seoul to deploy an advanced U.S. missile defense system, saying it would impact upon China’s own security.

“The focus of the nuclear issue on the peninsula is between the United States and North Korea,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told a daily news briefing.

“We urge the United States and North Korea to sit down and have communications and negotiations, to explore ways to resolve each other’s reasonable concerns and finally reach the goal we all want reached.”

North Korea launched a long-range rocket on Feb. 7 carrying what it called a satellite, drawing renewed international condemnation just weeks after it carried out a nuclear bomb test.

It said the launch was for peaceful purposes, but Seoul and Washington have said it violated United Nations Security Council resolutions because it used ballistic missile technology.

North Korea’s nuclear bomb test last month was also banned by a U.N. resolution.

China, while frustrated by North Korea and having signed up for numerous previous rounds of United Nations sanctions on its isolated neighbor, has said it does not believe sanctions are the way to resolve the problem and has urged a return to talks.

Numerous efforts to restart multilateral talks have failed since negotiations collapsed following the last round in 2008.

Chinese popular opinion has become increasingly fed up with North Korea, a country once a close diplomatic ally.

In an editorial on Monday, the official English-language China Daily called for new U.N. sanctions to “truly bite”.

“The threat of a nuclear-armed DPRK is more real than ever,” it said, using the North’s formal name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Hong repeated that North Korea would have to “pay a price” for its behavior.

Tension persists on the Korean peninsula.

Last Wednesday, South Korea suspended operations at the Kaesong industrial zone just inside North Korea, as punishment for the rocket launch and nuclear test.

The North on Thursday called the action “a declaration of war” and expelled the South’s workers. Kaesong, which had operated for more than a decade, was the last venue for regular interaction between the divided Koreas.

Asked about the zone’s shutdown, Chinese spokesman Hong said the peninsula was in a “complex and sensitive” phase.

“We hope all sides can take steps to ameliorate the tense situation,” he said.

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

North Korea may get plutonium from restarted reactor in weeks, U.S. says

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – North Korea, which conducted its fourth nuclear test last month and launched a long-range rocket on Saturday, could begin to recover plutonium from a restarted nuclear reactor within weeks, the director of U.S. National Intelligence said on Tuesday.

James Clapper said that in 2013, following its third nuclear test, North Korea announced its intention to “refurbish and restart” facilities at its Yongbyon nuclear complex, to include the uranium enrichment facility and its graphite-moderated plutonium production reactor shut down in 2007.

“We assess that North Korea has followed through on its announcement by expanding its Yongbyon enrichment facility and restarting the plutonium production reactor,” Clapper said in prepared testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee.

“We further assess that North Korea has been operating the reactor long enough so that it could begin to recover plutonium from the reactor’s spent fuel within a matter of weeks to months,” he said in his annual Worldwide Threat Assessment.

North Korea has used its graphite-moderated reactor at Yongbyon as a source of plutonium for its atomic bombs. It tested a fourth nuclear device on Jan. 6.

North Korea said in September that Yongbyon was operating and that it was working to improve the “quality and quantity” of weapons which it could use against the United States at “any time.”

Clapper said North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile programs would “continue to pose a serious threat to U.S. interests and to the security environment in East Asia in 2016.”

He said North Korea had expanded the size and sophistication of its ballistic missile forces and was also “committed to developing a long-range, nuclear-armed missile that is capable of posing a direct threat to the United States.”

Clapper said Pyongyang had publicly displayed a road-mobile intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, on multiple occasions, and the U.S. assessment was that it had taken initial steps toward fielding the system, although it had not been flight-tested.

North Korea said that it launched a satellite into space on Saturday with a long-range rocket. The United States and its allies see the launch as cover for Pyongyang’s development of ballistic missile technology that could be used to deliver a nuclear weapon.

The launch was strongly condemned by the United States, its allies and the United Nations Security Council.

(Reporting by David Brunnstrom; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)

U.S. and allies aim to track North Korean rocket launch

SEOUL/TOKYO (Reuters) – The United States has deployed missile defense systems that will work with the Japanese and South Korean militaries to track a rocket North Korea says it will launch some time over an 18-day period beginning Monday.

China, the North’s sole major ally but opposed to Pyongyang’s nuclear program, appealed for calm.

North Korea has notified U.N. agencies it will launch a rocket carrying what it called an earth observation satellite some time between Feb. 8 and Feb. 25, triggering international opposition from governments that see it as a long-range missile test.

North Korea says it has a sovereign right to pursue a space program. But it is barred under U.N. Security Council resolutions from using ballistic missile technology.

Coming so soon after North Korea’s fourth nuclear test, on Jan. 6, also barred by Security Council resolutions, a rocket launch would raise concern that it plans to fit nuclear warheads on its missiles, giving it the capability to strike South Korea, Japan and possibly the U.S. West Coast.

China has told North Korea that it does not want to see anything happen that could further raise tension, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said, describing “a serious situation”, after a special envoy from China visited North Korea this week.

The United States has urged China to use its influence to rein in its neighbor.

Speaking to President Park Geun-hye, Chinese President Xi Jinping said he hoped all parties could bear in mind the broader picture of maintaining peace and stability on the peninsula, and “calmly deal with the present situation”, China’s Foreign Ministry said.

“The peninsula cannot be nuclearized, and cannot have war or chaos,” Xi said, also repeating a call for dialogue.

Japan’s Asahi Shimbun newspaper quoted Pentagon officials as saying that fuelling of the rocket appeared to have begun. It cited satellite footage showing increased activity around the missile launch and fuel storage areas, suggesting preparations for a launch could be completed within “a number of days” at the earliest.

A launch would draw fresh U.S. calls for tougher U.N. sanctions that are already under discussion in response to the nuclear test.

What would likely be an indigenous three-stage rocket will be tracked closely. South Korea and Japan have put their militaries on standby to shoot down the rocket, or its parts, if they go off course and threaten to crash on their territory.

“We will, as we always do, watch carefully if there’s a launch, track the launch, (and) have our missile defense assets positioned and ready,” U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said on Thursday.

“We plan a lot about it. We and our close allies – the Japanese and the South Koreans – are ready for it.”

South Korea has said its Aegis destroyers, its Green Pine anti-ballistic missile radar and early warning and control aircraft Peace Eye are ready.

A U.S. Navy spokesman confirmed the missile tracking ship USNS Howard O. Lorenzen arrived in Japan this week but declined to say if it was in response to the North’s planned launch.

SEARCH FOR CLUES

Boosters and other parts will also be tracked as they splash into the sea, in the hope they can be retrieved and analyzed for clues on Pyongyang’s rocket program.

“Retrieving parts or objects from the launch vehicle are the most important part of the rocket analysis,” said Markus Schiller, a rocketry expert based in Germany.

North Korea said the launch would be during the morning and gave coordinates of where the boosters and payload cover would drop in the Yellow Sea off the Korean Peninsula’s west coast and the Pacific to the east of the Philippines.

The U.S. Navy has sonar equipment and unmanned vehicles that could be used to help recover parts, according to Navy officials. It was not clear if that equipment is in the region.

North Korea last launched a long-range rocket in December 2012, sending what it described as a communications satellite into orbit.

South Korea’s navy retrieved the section of the first stage booster that was part of the fuel tank and one of the four steering engines that confirmed the presence of technology and materials that North Korea had not been known to possess.

Analysis pointed to a launch vehicle capable of carrying a payload of about 500 kg (1,100 lb) more than 10,000 km (6,200 miles), according to South Korea.

A typical nuclear warhead weighs about 300 kg, although North Korea is not believed to have been able to miniaturize a nuclear weapon to that size.

Recovered parts allowed experts to conclude that the second stage booster likely used Soviet-era Scud missile technology and did not use advanced propellant, indicating the rocket was suited for satellite launch but unfit to deliver a warhead.

“My guess is that if you took the rocket they used last time and put a warhead on it you probably would not be able to reach the United States,” said David Wright, co-director and senior scientist at the Global Security Program of the Union of Concerned Scientists.

The search for information on the North’s rocket program will not be easy.

“Some of the more interesting parts, high-efficiency engines and guidance systems, are in the upper stages, and those usually fall far out to sea, at high speed into deep water,” said John Schilling, an aerospace engineer.

“Harder to find than that Malaysian airliner everybody has been looking for all last year.”

(Additional reporting by Andrea Shalal, David Brunnstrom, Ben Blanchard and Elaine Lies; Editing by Tony Munroe, Robert Birsel and Ralph Boulton)

Ex-government employee pleads guilty in nuclear secrets cyber attack scheme

A former government employee who was accused of trying to orchestrate a cyber attack against computers that contained information about nuclear weapons pleaded guilty to a federal computer crime, the Department of Justice announced in a news release on Tuesday afternoon.

Prosecutors said 62-year-old Charles Harvey Eccleston, a former employee of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, admitted his guilt in the attempted “spear-phishing” attack that took place last January. Eccleston was arrested after an undercover operation in which prosecutors said the accused dealt with FBI employees who had been posing as foreign government officials.

Spear-phishing is a type of cyber attack in which people send authentic-looking emails to their targets, encouraging the recipients to open them. However, the emails contain malicious code.

According to the Department of Justice, Eccleston sent an email that he believed contained a virus to about 80 Department of Energy employees, thinking the code would allow a foreign country to infiltrate or harm their computers. Prosecutors said Eccleston targeted employees “whom he claimed had access to information related to nuclear weapons or nuclear materials.”

The code was harmless and was actually crafted by the FBI, according to the release.

Eccleston, who thought he would be paid roughly $80,000 for sending the spear-phishing email, was arrested last March during a meeting with an undercover FBI employee, prosecutors said.

“Eccleston admitted that he attempted to compromise, exploit and damage U.S. government computer systems that contained sensitive nuclear weapon-related information with the intent of allowing foreign nations to gain access to that information or to damage essential systems,” Assistant Attorney General John P. Carlin said in a statement announcing the guilty plea.

Prosecutors said Eccleston was fired from his job with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2010. He moved to the Philippines the following year and had been living there until his arrest.

The alleged cyber attack wasn’t the first time that law enforcement heard Eccleston’s name.

Prosecutors said the FBI first learned about Eccleston in 2013 after he walked into an embassy in the Philippines and offered to sell a list of 5,000 U.S. government email accounts for $18,800. If the nation wasn’t interested, Eccleston said he would offer the list to China, Iran or Venezuela.

That November, the FBI sent undercover employees to meet with Eccleston and had them pose as foreign government officials. One FBI employee bought a list of 1,200 email addresses for $5,000, prosecutors said, though an investigation found the accounts were publicly available.

Prosecutors said Eccleston communicated with the employees for “several months,” and offered to help design the spear-phishing emails during a meeting with an undercover FBI employee in June 2014. He made the bogus emails look like advertisements for a nuclear energy conference.

Eccleston pleaded guilty to attempted unauthorized access and intentional damage to a protected computer and faces 24 to 30 months in prison and a $95,000 fine when he is sentenced in April, prosecutors announced.

North Korea tells U.N. agencies it plans satellite launch

SEOUL/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – North Korea told U.N. agencies on Tuesday it plans to launch a satellite as early as next week, a move that could advance the country’s long-range missile technology after its fourth nuclear test on Jan. 6.

News of the planned launch between Feb. 8 and Feb. 25 drew fresh U.S. calls for tougher U.N. sanctions already under discussion in response to North Korea’s nuclear test. State Department spokesman John Kirby said the United Nations needed to “send the North Koreans a swift, firm message.”

Pyongyang has said it has a sovereign right to pursue a space program by launching rockets, although the United States and other governments worry that such launches are missile tests in disguise.

“We have received information from DPRK regarding the launch of earth observation satellite ‘Kwangmyongsong’ between 8-25 February,” a spokeswoman for the International Maritime Organization, a U.N. agency, told Reuters by email.

The International Telecommunication Union, another U.N. agency, told Reuters North Korea had informed it on Tuesday of plans to launch a satellite with a functional duration of four years, in a non-geostationary orbit.

It said the information provided by North Korea, whose official name is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, was incomplete, and that it was seeking more details.

U.S. officials said last week that North Korea was believed to be making preparations for a test launch of a long-range rocket, after activity at its test site was observed by satellite.

The White House said on Tuesday that any satellite launch by North Korea would be viewed as “another destabilizing provocation.” U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Russel, the senior U.S. diplomat for East Asia, told reporters it “argues even more strongly” for tougher U.N. sanctions.

Russel said a launch, “using ballistic missile technology,” would be an “egregious violation” of North Korea’s international obligations.

He said it showed the need “to raise the cost to the leaders through the imposition of tough additional sanctions and of course by ensuring the thorough and rigorous enforcement of the existing sanctions.”

Russel said negotiations were “active” at the United Nations and that the United States and North Korea’s main ally China “share the view that there needs to be consequences to North Korea for its defiance and for its threatening behaviors.”

“Our diplomats are in deep discussion in New York about how to tighten sanctions, how to respond to violations,” he said.

Asked about China’s cautious response to U.S. calls for stronger and more effective sanctions on Pyongyang and Beijing’s stress on the need for dialogue, Russel said:

“Yet another violation by the DPRK of the U.N. Security Council resolution, coming on the heels of its nuclear test, would be an unmistakable slap in the face to those who argue that you just need to show patience and dialogue with the North Koreans, but not sanctions.”

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said China had “unique influence over the North Korean regime” and added: “we … certainly are pleased to be able to work cooperatively and effectively with the Chinese to counter this threat.”

Earlier on Tuesday, China’s envoy for the North Korean nuclear issue arrived in the capital Pyongyang, the North’s KCNA news agency reported.

North Korea last launched a long-range rocket in December 2012, sending an object it described as a communications satellite into orbit.

Western and Asian experts have said that launch was part of an effort to build an intercontinental ballistic missile.

North Korea has shown off two versions of a ballistic missile resembling a type that could reach the U.S. West Coast, but there is no evidence the missiles have been tested.

Pyongyang is also seen to be working to miniaturize a nuclear warhead to mount on a missile, but many experts say it is some time away from perfecting such technology.

North Korea said it successfully tested a hydrogen bomb last month but this was met with skepticism by U.S. and South Korean officials and nuclear experts. They said the blast was too small for it to have been a full-fledged hydrogen bomb.

(Additional reporting by Jack Kim in Seoul, Nobuhiro Kubo in Tokyo and David Brunnstrom, Ayesha Rascoe, Mohammad Zargham and Doina Chiacu in Washington; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Grant McCool)