'Pakistan, N. Korea aided Iran's nuclear program'

The next IAEA report on the Iranian nuclear program will reveal that Tehran received assistance from several foreign countries, including Russia, Pakistan and North Korea, Western diplomats said Tuesday.

According to several media outlets, including the Washington Post, the UN's nuclear watchdog has concluded

that Iran's nuclear program received assistance from Russian scientists on "how to build high-precision detonators that can be used to trigger nuclear chain reactions."Former Soviet scientist Vyacheslav Danilenko was allegedly contacted by Iran's Physics Research Center in the mid-1990s to assist in its nuclear efforts. Documents obtained by the IAEA suggest he helped design a high-explosive device used to trigger a nuclear chain reaction.

The UK's Daily Telegraph reported the some of the findings substantiate reports suggesting that Abdul Qadeer Khan, who is considered the "father" of Pakistan's atom bomb, gave Iran the necessary blueprints for a neutron initiator – a key element in nuclear bombs.

North Korean scientists have reportedly provided mathematical formulas and codes involved in designing a nuclear device.

The IAEA has reportedly obtained evidence supporting the claim that Iran has implemented a computer simulation of a nuclear warhead.

David Albright, a former IAEA official who reviewed the report's findings, was quoted as saying that Iran "has sufficient information to design and produce a workable implosion nuclear device using highly enriched uranium as its fissile core."

While speculations about a possible strike against Iran's nuclear facilities have grown, the United States, UK and Russia have said that "tough diplomacy" has yet to be exhausted.

The international community is pushing for a new round of sanctions on Iran, which experts say are likely to have a more significant "bite."

Israel said it expects the international community to impose "debilitating sanctions" on the Islamic Republic.

"Even if the UN Security Council will find it hard to issue dramatic sanctions, Iran could still suffer from financial sanctions – it has financial interests which are vulnerable," a Jerusalem source said.

North Korea disputes Seoul's border shelling claim

North Korea has dismissed a reported artillery exchange with South Korea on Wednesday, saying the South mistook construction noise for shelling.

Pyongyang said Seoul's reaction was "preposterous" and that the sounds were those of "normal blasting" at a

building site near the maritime border.

Seoul earlier said it fired warning shots after the North's shelling off the South's Yeonpyeong island.

Last November the North fired shells at Yeonpyeong, killing four people.

'Tragicomedy'

On Thursday, North Korea's official KCNA news agency accused Seoul of overreacting to "normal blasting" from a North Korean construction project "aimed at improving the standard of people's living".

"It was preposterous in the age of science when latest detecting and intelligence means are available that they mistook the blasting for shelling," the KCNA report said.

"It was a tragicomedy that they indiscriminately reacted to what happened with counter-shelling even without confirming the truth about the case in the sensitive waters."

South Korean defence officials earlier said there were two separate shelling incidents on Wednesday. All the shells landed in the water

The South's decision to reply with warning shots follows strong criticism for failing to react with force to the attack on Yeonpyeong last year.

Pyongyang said at the time that it had been provoked by military exercises being held by the South close to the island.

The incident triggered outrage in South Korea, which increased troop numbers on Yeonpyeong and said it would respond more forcefully in the future.

The crisis came months after the sinking of a South Korean warship, the Cheonan, widely blamed on North Korea.

Tropical storm causes losses of $480m: China

China said a tropical storm caused losses of about 3.1 billion yuan ($480 million), destroying hundreds of homes as it battered the country's east coast before slamming into North Korea on Tuesday.

The Chinese weather agency said it had downgraded Tropical Storm Muifa to a depression after it made

landfall in North Korea early Tuesday, avoiding a feared direct hit on China's densely populated commercial capital Shanghai further south.

The National Disaster Reduction Committee said 1.35 million people were evacuated, 600 houses destroyed and another 4,800 damaged as Muifa skirted China's eastern coast.

There were no confirmed deaths in China, but one person was missing after a boat sank, and four people were killed in neighbouring South Korea.

North Korea's state-run news agency, KCNA, reported heavy rain but gave no details of any damage or casualties.

In Shanghai, hundreds of flights had to be cancelled and thousands of fishing boats were called back to port over the weekend.

US oil giant ConocoPhillips said the storm had forced it to suspend clean-up operations on a two-month-old oil spill off the coast of Shandong province.

Authorities had expressed concern that Muifa could cause destruction similar to that unleashed by Typhoon Saomai in 2006, which was the worst to hit China in 50 years and killed at least 450 people.

On Monday there was a brief scare after the storm destroyed a dyke protecting a chemical plant from the sea on the north-east coast but China later said workers had managed to repair it.

Thousands of soldiers were on standby to conduct rescue and relief work after the storm passes, the official Xinhua news agency said.

In Dandong, on the China side of the border with North Korea, authorities have set up more than 750 temporary shelters that are capable of accommodating more than a million people, Xinhua reported.