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White House national security adviser John Bolton said on Sunday he believed the bulk of North Korea's weapons could be
Bolton told CBS's
Face the Nation That Washington has devised a program to dismantle North Korea's weapons of mass destruction – chemical, biological and nuclear – and ballistic missile programs in a year, if there is full cooperation and disclosure from Pyongyang.
READ MORE: North Korea Making 'rapid' Trump-Kim Summit Pledge
"If they have the strategic decision already made to do that and they're cooperative, we can move very quickly," he said. . "
WATCH: Mattis unaware of steps taken by North Korea to denuclearize
He said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will likely discuss that proposal with the North Koreans soon. The Financial Times reported that Pompeo was due to visit North Korea this week the State Department
"It would be possible to dismantle the bulk of the bulk of North Korea's programs within a year, "said Thomas Countryman, the State Department's top arms control officer under President Barack Obama.
" I do not believe it would be possible to verify full dismantlement within a year, nor have I yet seen evidence of a firm DPRK decision to undertake full dismantlement. "
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Siegfried Hecker, a nuclear scientist and Stanford University professor, has predicted it would be 10 years to dismantle North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear site.
South Korea media report Sung Kim, the American ambassador to the Philippines, with North Korean officials on the border on Sunday to coordinate an agenda for Pompeo's next visit to North Korea.
U.S. intelligence is not certain how many nuclear warheads North Korea has. The Defense Intelligence Agency is at the end of an estimate of about 50, but all the agencies believe that Pyongyang is a recess of a particular number, especially smaller tactical ones, in caves and other underground facilities around the country.
TRUST BUT VERIFY [19659004] North Korea agreed at the summit to "work toward denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula," but the joint statement signed by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump on June 12 gave Pyongyang a chance to surrender nuclear weapons.
US intelligence agencies believe North Korea has increased production of fuel for nuclear weapons in the United States, NBC News quoted US officials as saying on Friday.
READ MORE: North Korea annual skips' anti-US imperialism 'rally following Trump-Kim summit
The Washington Post reported on Saturday that U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that North Korea does not intend to fully give up its nuclear arsenal and is considering ways to hide the number of weapons it has. It also reported Pyongyang has secret production facilities, according to the latest evidence they have
Bolton refused to comment on the issue of intelligence matters.
"We know exactly what the risks are – they're going to keep their nuclear, chemical, biological weapons programs and ballistic missiles," he said.
"There's not any starry -eyed feeling among the group doing this, "he said. "Expert on the North Koreans have done in the past."
Asia expert Patrick Cronin called the NBC and Washington Post reports "extremely worrisome."
Cronin, senior director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, said he had heard from US and South Korea officials that it was expected to return to Pyongyang at the end of this week that Sung Kim was working to prepare the way for that trip [19659003] READ MORE: Trump flip-flops on North Korea, says they still pose 'extraordinary threat' to US
The US side was "working to see if they can prepare for high-level talks between Secretary Pompeo and Kim Jong Un others in Pyongyang that would be a specific denuclearization road map, or at least significant dismantlement steps that could fill a roadmap, "he said.
Republican Senator Susan Collins said she was troubled by the news reports. "North Korea has a long history of cheating on agreements that it's made with previous administrations," she said on CNN's State of the Union . Collins stressed the need for "verifiable, unimpeded, reliable inspections" of the North's weapons programs.
Another of Trump's fellow Republicans in the US Senate, Lindsey Graham, echoed the need for skepticism.
"If it is true that they are saying one thing and doing another, nobody should be surprised, "he said on NBC's Meet the Press .
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