( Newsvine ) South Korea's foreign minister dismissed allegations that North Korea was cooperating with Syria on a nuclear weapons program, a news report said Monday.
The comments by South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon came amid suspicions of North Korean cooperation with Syria on a nuclear facility, which arose after an alleged Israeli air raid earlier this month on unknown Syrian targets.
"Now, no one is talking about the suspicions regarding North Korea and Syria with a clear basis," Yonhap news agency quoted Song as telling reporters. The Foreign Ministry said it could not immediately confirm the report.
A senior U.S. nuclear official said Friday that North Koreans were in Syria and that Syria may have had contacts with "secret suppliers" to obtain nuclear equipment.
Andrew Semmel , acting U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for nuclear nonproliferation policy, did not identify the suppliers, but also said he could not exclude that the network run by disgraced Pakistan nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan may have been involved.
However, Song said Monday that Syria does not have a nuclear facility as far as he knows, according to Yonhap .
A state-run newspaper in Syria said in an editorial Sunday referring to the nuclear allegations that "the magnitude of these false accusations might be a prelude to a new aggression against Syria." Al- Thawra said suggestion of such nuclear cooperation was "a flagrant lie."