Carefully playing its cards, North Korea may have successfully brought the United States to the negotiating table. Angry over being labeled as part of the "axis of evil," along with the failure of the U.S. to live up to its energy commitments agreed to in 1994, Pyongyang took advantage of the looming war in Iraq to complicate U.S. strategic goals and to thrust North Korea's political and economic concerns on to the global stage.
In 1994, in what is known as the Agreed Framework, the United States offered to lower trade and economic barriers along with guaranteeing that two 1,000 megawatt light water reactors (LWR) would be built in North Korea by 2003. In exchange for the promise of the reactors, the D.P.R.K. ended construction of its plutonium graphite-moderated nuclear reactors. Like enriched uranium, plutonium waste can be used to make nuclear weapons (it is much more difficult to convert LWR waste into weapons-grade material).
In 1994, in what is known as the Agreed Framework, the United States offered to lower trade and economic barriers along with guaranteeing that two 1,000 megawatt light water reactors (LWR) would be built in North Korea by 2003. In exchange for the promise of the reactors, the D.P.R.K. ended construction of its plutonium graphite-moderated nuclear reactors. Like enriched uranium, plutonium waste can be used to make nuclear weapons (it is much more difficult to convert LWR waste into weapons-grade material).
But contrary to the agreement, construction of the LWRs remained far behind schedule. In fact, before the current crisis, the first LWR was not expected to reach completion until at least 2008, even though the 1994 agreement specified that both reactors would be built by 2003. While North Korea's test fire of a Taepo-Dong-1 missile in 1998 delayed construction of the reactors, it did not violate the agreement; Secretary of State Colin Powell stated in February of 2002 that North Korea has so far "stay[ed] within the agreement."