South Korean President Lee denies US intel leak on North Korea’s nuclear site
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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his daughter inspecting the test-firing of a ballistic missile at an undisclosed location in North Korea on April 19.
PHOTO: AFP
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SEOUL – South Korean President Lee Jae Myung rejected allegations that a minister publicly identified the location of a North Korean nuclear facility based on US intelligence, calling the accusation “absurd”.
The South Korean media reported that the US is limiting intelligence sharing on North Korea with Seoul after Unification Minister Chung Dong-young publicly identified North Korea’s uranium enrichment facility in Kusong in March.
“Any claim or action based on the premise that Minister Chung ‘leaked classified information provided by the US’ is wrong,” Mr Lee wrote in a post on social media platform X on April 20.
Mr Lee said the existence of the Kusong facility had been widely known through academic papers and media reports before Mr Chung’s remarks.
“We should look into why something this absurd is happening,” he said.
A US Forces Korea official said on April 20 that it is aware of the media reports, adding that the US military is working alongside South Korea to deter aggression and maintain peace on the peninsula. The US embassy in Seoul declined to comment on diplomatic conversations when reached by Bloomberg News.
The US has been restricting sharing some North Korea intelligence gathered via satellite with South Korea since early April, Yonhap News reported, citing a senior military official it did not identify. The report said information sharing on North Korea’s military activities are under way as usual.
Mr Chung, a five-term lawmaker, returned to the post in charge of relations with North Korea in July 2025 after serving as the unification minister under former president Roh Moo-hyun’s liberal government two decades earlier.
“Claims of an intelligence leak are completely groundless,” the minister said in a post on social media platform Facebook on April 20. Mr Chung said he has not received any reports on North Korea’s nuclear facilities since taking office, and criticised the opposition for “exaggerating the situation as if there were a major rift between South Korea and the US”.
The episode comes as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has been speeding up developing his nuclear and missile capabilities while the US shifts focus to the Middle East.
South Korea, a key US ally that hosts some 28,500 American troops, has been under pressure from US President Donald Trump to send warships to the Strait of Hormuz to help protect shipping. BLOOMBERG
