MISSILE DEFENSE
Confidential report lists US weapons system designs compromised by Chinese cyberspies
Ellen Nakashima, The Washington Post – May 27, 2013
Designs for many of the nation’s most sensitive advanced weapons systems have been compromised by Chinese hackers, according to a report prepared for the Pentagon and to officials from government and the defense industry.
Among more than two dozen major weapons systems whose designs were breached were programs critical to U.S. missile defenses and combat aircraft and ships, according to a previously undisclosed section of a confidential report prepared for Pentagon leaders by the Defense Science Board.
Russia Says US Missile Defense Offer Insufficient
Associated Press – May 27, 2013
A senior Russian diplomat says Washington’s latest moves aimed at easing Moscow’s concern about NATO’s U.S.-led missile defense plans are insufficient.
NORTH KOREA
Six-party soap opera set to restart
Andrei Lankov, Asia Times – May 28, 2013
Recent talks between China’s President Xi Jinping and Vice Marshall Ch’oe Ryong-hae, North Korea’s special envoy to China, produced a rather unexpected result: North Korea agreed to resume the six-party nuclear talks.
This is a remarkable about face on the part of the North Koreans, since the last round of the six-party talks took place in 2007, and in 2009 the talks were officially pronounced dead (well, discontinued).
South Korea Urges North to Be Serious Before Talks
Choe Sang-Hun, The New York Times – May 27, 2013
South Korea opposes engaging the North in another round of “talks for talks’ sake,” its foreign minister said Monday, after a special North Korean envoy reportedly told Beijing that the North was ready to return to the negotiating table.
N. Korea says no plans to give up nuclear capabilities
Yonhap News Agency – May 28, 2013
North Korea said Tuesday that it has no plans to unilaterally give up its nuclear capabilities in the face of ceaseless threats from the United States.
The stance announced in a article carried by the Rodong Sinmun, an organ of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK), said Washington needs to first end its belligerent attitude and claims that the North poses security risks.
IRAN
Iran’s presidential candidates clash over nuclear approach
Yeganeh Torbati, Reuters – May 28, 2013
A former Iranian nuclear negotiator who is running for president used his first television appearance of the campaign to reject accusations he had been too soft in negotiations with world powers.
The most prominent moderate candidate in an election dominated by hardliners, cleric Hassan Rohani, nuclear negotiator from 2003 to 2005, oversaw an agreement to suspend Iran’s fledgling uranium enrichment-related activities.
