This article is the first in a series on North Korea’s science and technology development policy and its implications for the development of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Additional articles in the series will appear in future issues of WMD Insights.

The international media recently have reported on a number of illegal exports of dual-use items and technology transfers from Japan to North Korea, including the export of freeze dryers that can be used to prepare biological warfare agents and the transfer of technical data on a new medium-range surface-to-air missile (SAM) that Japan is currently developing. [1] These cases – along with recent developments surrounding North Korea’s alleged money laundering, counterfeiting, narcotics trafficking, and other illicit activities – have brought increased scrutiny to Pyongyang’s international networks for procuring resources and technology.

Unofficial Networks
The transfer of freeze dryers and missile technology to Pyongyang has focused attention on the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (GAKRJ, commonly known as chosoren, in Japanese or choch’ong’ryŏn in Korean) and on an affiliated group, known as the Korean Association of Science and Technology (KAST, commonly known as kakyo, in Japanese, or kwahyŏp, in Korean). KAST, specifically, has been linked in the press to the illicit transfer to Pyongyang of data on Japan’s new surface-to-air missile. [2] KAST is a network of Korean-Japanese scientists and engineers sympathetic to the DPRK. According to Japanese author Atsushi Kiyomizu, KAST, which was formed in June 1955, is a secretive organization engaged in gathering technical materials in Japan and sending such materials and scientists to North Korea for Pyongyang’s benefit. [3]

The GAKRJ website claims KAST members have made “important contributions to science and technology that have supported North Korean development and prosperity.” [4] This contribution to North Korea would fulfill a request for such assistance that Kim Il Sung made in a meeting with Korean-Japanese scientists on December 16, 1972. Kim later thanked them for their support in a speech he delivered on April 13, 1979, regarding the assistance of Korean scientists in Japan toward the development of North Korean science and technology. In particular, KAST scientists have played a significant role in providing information about machine tools, electronics, biology, and food processing. [5] While it is impossible to estimate the amount of technical information transferred to Pyongyang by these overseas groups, the Internet has made it much easier for them to collect technical information and deliver it to the DPRK. [6]

There are similar networks of ethnic Korean scientists and engineers in China, Russia, and the United States that reportedly aid North Korea. The North Korean media have reported on visits to Pyongyang by these groups, but there is little information about the scale of the scientific cooperation or the types of technology the DPRK has obtained from them. For example, little is known about the Association of Korean Scientists and Technicians in the United States (KASTUS), led by Chairman Song Ki-roe, but a KASTUS delegation was reported to have visited Pyongyang in December 2002, as part of the celebration to mark the 50th anniversary of the founding of the DPRK’s Academy of Science. [7]

KASTUS maintains no official public presence in the United States, but a source claims it has fewer than 100 members and mostly operates out of Los Angeles. The association reportedly approaches South Korean or Korean-American scientists in the United States and extends invitations to visit the DPRK. The group also is reportedly connected to a Methodist church in New York that coordinates family reunions with relatives in North Korea. When scientists visit North Korea, they are asked to provide information on advanced technologies, such as computer technology, nanotechnology, genetic engineering, and biotechnology. The group is also rumored to operate in Canada, which established diplomatic relations with the DPRK in February 2001. [8]

Official Cooperation
The DPRK also seeks to advance its scientific and technical capabilities through official channels. During 2001-2002, for example, North Korea participated in official scientific exchanges with Australia through the Australian Academy of Science, and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering. After having hosted a North Korean exploratory mission to develop collaborative linkages between relevant academies, universities, government departments, and industry groups, and after having trained two Korean researchers at La Trobe University, the Australian government discontinued the exchange program in the fall of 2002 due to increasing concerns about North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. [9] However, the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) continues to allow North Korean researchers to be trained privately in Australia, supported by North Korean funds. On January 18, 2006, DFAT rejected North Korea’s latest request to resume the collaborative scientific efforts, citing the current stalemate in the six-party talks regarding the DPRK’s nuclear weapons program. [10] The request was made by the DPRK Embassy in an August 23, 2005, statement submitted to the Foreign Affairs Subcommittee of the Australian Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence, and Trade. [11]

Pyongyang has had some success in opening official cooperation in the sciences with South Korea, as well. In August 2005, the 10th North-South Korea economic meeting was held and for the first time included discussions on potential North-South scientific cooperation in the fields of biotechnology, nanotechnology, chemical engineering, energy sciences, and information technology. [12] However, progress has been slow due to tensions over the stalled six-party talks, U.S. sanctions against North Korea, North Korean defections to the South, and increasing criticism by the South Korean opposition Grand National Party (GNP; or Hannaradang in Korean) of the current South Korean government’s engagement policy with Pyongyang. [13] [14]

Despite these obstacles, in December 2005, five South Korean scientists participated in a chemical industry seminar with five North Korean scientists and five KAST members in Beijing. The South Korean delegation was led by Dr. Kim Tae-hwang, an organic chemist and head of the Biological Molecular Chemistry Research Laboratory at the Korea Research Institute of Chemical Technology, in Taejŏn, South Korea. Dr. Kim Kŏn-su of the DPRK Academy of Science led the North Korean delegation and KAST Chairman Hwang Ch’ŏl-hong led the KAST team from Japan.

The South Korean scientists gave presentations on the carbon chemistry of fuels and agrochemicals, and on micro-organic chemistry. The North Koreans discussed their “experience with an independent and unique method of producing acetic acid.” KAST Chairman Hwang led a discussion on “research into carbon chemistry for fuels and its importance for North-South economic development.” Finally, the participants reportedly agreed to create an English-language science publication and establish a North-South
science and technology cooperation center in Pyongyang. [15]

Doctrine and Institutional Setting
The DPRK has sought foreign technology since the early days of the republic. [16] Pyongyang concluded a number of scientific cooperation agreements with the Soviet Union, China, and eastern European countries, but since 1990, scientific exchanges have diminished due to the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the former USSR. The DPRK has targeted scientific and technological development as a way to compensate for its domestic economic inefficiencies, energy shortages, and the misallocation of resources that have resulted from central planning and excessive investment in heavy industries. Since suffering extreme economic distress in the 1990s, Pyongyang has increased its emphasis on science and technology, which is seen as supporting economic recovery, the sustainability of one-party rule under Kim Jong Il and the Korean Workers Party (KWP), and the development of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

Science and technology are critical pillars of the state objective of “building a strong and powerful country” (kangsŏngdaeguk). The concept of kangsŏngdaeguk emerged in 1998, as Kim Jong Il officially rose to power. The state doctrine focuses on ideology, politics, military power, and economics – with science and technology considered critical for achieving the nation’s military and economic goals. [17] In keeping with this policy, the DPRK increased the national budget for scientific activities by 6.3 percent in 1999 and by 5.4 percent in 2000, despite the severe economic challenges the country faced at the time. The DPRK declared 1999 the “year of science,” which witnessed a significant increase in Kim Jong Il’s “on-the-spot guidance” at science-related sites. [18]

According to the North Korean “Socialist Constitution” of 1998, the nation must “draft and execute a plan for the development of science and technology that increases the creative cooperation among scientists, technicians and [economic] producers,” but there are no additional details in the charter. The constitution also requires the DPRK to “introduce advanced science and technology, and to achieve a world-class level of scientific development.” [19]

North Korea’s Science and Technology Act identifies the following scientific areas that should be developed: electronics, biotechnology, thermal engineering, information technology, material science, and aerospace engineering. The Act stipulates that the DPRK will cooperate and conduct scientific exchanges with other countries and international organizations. The Act establishes the Cabinet as the controlling authority over science and technology, and requires the drafting of a science and technology plan with the consultation of “scientific entities, enterprises and societal groups.” All new science and technology must be registered with the state, which maintains strict control over the application of new science and technology. [20]

The Cabinet is ultimately responsible for science planning and policy implementation, but it consults with the Science and Education Department under the KWP Secretariat. The Cabinet delegates the initial planning process to the Science and Technology Planning Office, under the government’s National Planning Committee. The Cabinet also consults on national scientific and technological objectives with the line ministries and the Academy of Sciences, which holds the equivalent position of a cabinet ministry. [21]

The Academy of Science is a large, centralized organization with numerous research institutes under its authority. Most of these institutes are tasked with research and development related to national economic planning, but some of these activities could be applied to WMD-related development, such as work in the area of machine tools, computer science, semi-conductors, and biotechnology. The Second Natural Science Academy, which was founded in the early 1960s as the National Defense Science Academy, is in charge of military-related research and has about 40 research institutes under its control. The Second Natural Science Academy is under the supervision of the KWP’s Central Military Committee, and it conducts R&D activities for the Second Economic Committee, which controls and operates the DPRK’s defense industries. [22]

Pyongyang’s science and technology policy not only has implications for strengthening national economic and defense capabilities, but also carries significant political overtones. Since officially assuming power in 1998, Kim Jong Il has presented himself as a promoter of scientific progress for national development, and has been credited with an interest in science and technology since the 1970s. In February 1978, North Korea formed “shock troops of scientists and technicians” (kwahakcha-kisulcha tol’gyŏktae) under Kim’s instructions. That year was the first of the Second 7-Year Plan (1978-1984) that focused on infusing the national economy with chuch’e (self-reliance), modernization, and science. [23] In March 1988, the KWP Central Committee approved Kim’s instructions to implement a “Three-Year Plan for the Development of Science and Technology (July 1988 – June 1991).” The second three-year plan immediately followed the first (July 1991 – June 1994). [24] These plans were mainly designed to help revitalize the economy, targeting machinery, electronics, industrial automation, the chemical industry, and agriculture. [25]

As North Korea experienced difficulties in achieving its objectives in science and technology, the country held a national convention for scientists in October 1991 and drafted the “Outlook and Targets for Developments in Science and Technology by 2000.” This document included plans to introduce advanced technologies in the areas of computer science and atomic energy, among others, and it called for acquiring funding support and increasing exchanges with the United Nations Development Program. [26] This coincided with an apparent strategy of diversifying North Korea’s sources of foreign technology, which traditionally had come mostly from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.

The DPRK is backward in many areas, and foreign technology transfers could accelerate development, including the development of WMD. But international export controls are not the only obstacles to the acquisition of foreign technology. Decades of isolation and an autarkic development strategy have generated an inward-looking society cut off from foreign ideas. While xenophobic nationalism remains strong, the state under Kim Jong Il desires to benefit from technology transfers – regardless of their origin – while at the same time avoiding any “impure” ideas that could accompany the transfers and “contaminate ideologically pure citizens,” a stance that can impede the free flow of scientific knowledge.

Changing the perception North Korean society has of the outside world might be difficult for the KWP, but the state considers science and technology to be critical for achieving the broad national strategy of “building a strong and powerful socialist state in the son’gun [military-first] era.” [27] North Korean publications advocate the introduction of foreign technology by acquiring books and materials from abroad and through personnel exchanges. [28] To meet national objectives, Pyongyang has little choice but to continue to seek advanced science and technology through overseas networks, especially overseas Koreans who are sympathetic to the DPRK. The strategy will pose continuing challenges for those seeking to constrain North Korean WMD and other military capabilities by restricting the country’s access to sensitive technology.

Daniel A. Pinkston and Dave H. Kim – Monterey Institute Center for Nonproliferation Studies