Jong-Il's birthday was celebrated with calls for military preparations

PYONGYANG, February 16 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – North Korea's director of energy has revealed plans to build four more nuclear plants, each bigger and more powerful than the controversial Yongbyon plant that America fears may be used to develop nuclear weapons, according to a report published in a British paper on Sunday, February 16.

In an interview with The Telegraph, Kim Jae Rok argued that "desperate measures" were called for because much of North Korea is without heat or lighting.

He said that the planned nuclear plants could produce up to 200 megawatts of power - 40 times the output of Yongbyon.

"This will enable us to meet the urgent need for electricity supplies in our country," said Kim from his office in the capital, Pyongyang.

While North Korea was in festive mood this weekend, celebrating the 61st birthday Sunday of its leader, Kim Jong-Il, news of the expansion plans will cause fresh alarm in America where intelligence agencies fear the regime could be producing nuclear weapons.

Last week George Tenet, the director of the CIA, warned for the first time that North Korea has nuclear weapons and a missile which could carry them to the west coast of America.

Tenet was speaking hours after North Korea was declared in violation of nuclear non-proliferation accords and reported to the United Nations Security Council. That could result in economic sanctions which the Stalinist state has warned may lead to war.

"They probably have one or two plutonium-based devices today," Tenet told a Senate armed services committee hearing. "I think one or two is a very good judgment."

Asked if North Korea had a missile that could hit the west coast, he replied: "Yes they could do that."

Kim insisted that North Korea was not producing nuclear weapons in its present facilities and would not use the planned new plants to do so. It is, however, difficult to see where the power already produced at Yongbyon is being used. In a country roughly the size of the United Kingdom, few people have access to a basic electricity supply, let alone consumer electronics.

Leader’s Birthday Celebrated

NKorea has plans to build more nuclear plants, bigger and more powerful than the controversial Yongbyon plant

On Sunday, February 16, North Korea marked leader Kim Jong-Il's birthday Sunday with a call for its military to strengthen preparations for a U.S. attack on the famine-hit Stalinist country.

"All servicemen should always be on the alert," Rodong Sinmun, the mouthpiece of the North's ruling Workers' Party, said in an editorial monitored by South Korea's Yonhap news agency.

The newspaper, dedicated to Kim's 61st birthday, accused Washington of using the stand-off over North Korea's nuclear weapons drive for "its ambition to squeeze our republic to death."

As the crisis deepened, the Stalinist regime has stepped up propaganda to rouse its people and army to prepare for a showdown with the United States.

Top government and party officials held an indoor rally in Pyongyang Saturday, vowing to uphold Kim and defend socialism, according to the North's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

"Our army and people with Kim Jong-Il at the van(guard) remain unfazed and our victory is certain in the confrontation with the imperialists," senior party member Jon Pyong-Ho said in a speech.

Describing Kim's birth as "a great fortune of Korea," Jon also stressed the need to "foil the obstructive moves of the anti-reunification forces at home and abroad," KCNA said.

The U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) declared North Korea on Wednesday to be in breach of nuclear safeguard accords and referred the crisis to the Security Council, which could impose sanctions.