N-Reactor Project Begins In N. Korea

In a remote North Korean field surrounded by terraced hillsides, international delegates broke ground Tuesday on a remarkable construction project, under which Western countries will give North Korea two modern nuclear reactors.

The ceremony, which many critics had doubted would ever take place, marks a milestone in opening up North Korea to the outside world. It will lead to thousands of South Korean laborers, presumably well salted with spies, working within North Korea and sending mail and equipment and messages between two nations that technically remain at war.

The nuclear reactors are being built for North Korea in exchange for giving up older reactors that experts believed were a front for making nuclear weapons.