Taiwan said to conduct plutonium tests in '80s
VIENNA -- The UN nuclear watchdog agency has found that Taiwan's experiments with plutonium extended to the mid-1980s, diplomats said yesterday, uncovering a key detail about the country's now-abandoned nuclear weapons program.
It had been known that Taiwan briefly revived its nuclear weapons research program in the 1980s, and the disclosures confirm suspicions that plutonium-separation experiments were carried out at that time.
Taiwan first launched its nuclear weapons program in the 1960s, but suspended it the following decade under pressure from the United States, which apparently feared the response from Taiwan rival China.
Taiwan's government has never acknowledged having a secret weapons program, analysts say.
The experiments were uncovered in inspections and testing conducted by the International Atomic Energy Agency after the Taiwanese government agreed to voluntary extra controls on the country's peaceful nuclear program, the diplomats said.
The diplomats said their information was based on preliminary samples taken in Taiwan by IAEA inspectors that indicated plutonium-separation experiments probably continued until about 20 years ago.
The diplomats, who are familiar with the IAEA, spoke on the condition of anonymity. Officials at the Vienna-based IAEA said they would not comment.
One of the diplomats cautioned against drawing parallels between Taiwan and South Korea, whose government recently acknowledged that its scientists once dabbled in extracting plutonium and enriching uranium -- both of which can be used to make nuclear arms.
While the South Korean disclosures reflected continued secret weapons-related research, it was common knowledge that Taiwan engaged in nuclear weapons research after China exploded its first bomb in the 1960s, the diplomat said.
What the agency now was trying to do was to flesh out details of the Taiwanese program, with environmental sampling and other methods, he said.
The agency was not expecting to find new experiments with possible weapons applications beyond the mid-1980s, said the diplomat. But there will be new information because of the extra access Taiwan was now granting agency inspectors, he said.
In Taipei, Foreign Ministry spokesman Michel Lu said the ministry was not aware of the reports and would not immediately comment on them. Officials at Taiwan's Atomic Energy Council were not available for comment yesterday.
Andrew Yang, a defense analyst at the Chinese Council of Advanced Policy Studies, a Taipei think tank, said it has long been common knowledge in Taiwan that the island's nuclear scientists were working on a bomb in the 1970s and 1980s.
"I don't think they got anywhere close to building a nuclear device," Yang said, "but they did have the technology and the know-how."
The program was shut down and US officials sealed off the laboratories and test sites in 1988 shortly after a military officer involved in the project, Chang Hsien-yi, defected to the United States with computer information about the program.
