In June 2002, journalist Seymour M. Hersh reported intelligence information that North Korea was working on a nuclear weapons program using Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) caused the Bush administration to adopt a policy shift triggering “larger policy consequences that have redefined the East Asia political and security landscape.”45 In fact, the Clinton administration had received evidence in 1997 and 1998 that the DPRK was producing small amounts of HEU. Although not a violation of the Agreed Framework, which had suspended enrichment of plutonium, Pyongyang had pledged not to enrich uranium when it signed an agreement with the ROK in 1991. Clinton’s advisors had briefed the incoming administration about this, but Bush and his advisors did not make the information public. Pyongyang may have initiated an HEU weapons program as a hedge against the United States, Japan, and the ROK not implementing controversial provisions of the Agreed Framework,46 but it is just as likely that it sought an independent means to operate the Kumho LWRs, avoiding dependence on the United States for access to fuel.47 Not only were other signators of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) enriching uranium for fuel to power their LWRs, but North Korea was not obligated to allow inspection of undeclared sites until KEDO completed a significant portion of its work. In any event, the Bush administration, without proof, had decided that the DPRK had a secret program, privately advising congressional leaders to delay funding for the Kumho reactors because Pyongyang was violating the NPT. In May, Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John R. Bolton accused North Korea of not cooperating with the IAEA in allowing unfettered inspections to verify compliance with the NPT.48