The regime, which faces international isolation and sanctions, claims that the planned nuclear reactor is to be built for a "peaceful purpose" should be treated with scepticism.

Before commenting on the bizarre incident of a North Korean ship taking shelter from a storm by docking in Rangoon last week amid talk of missile technology transfer to Burma, we should look at the history of the country's keen interest in nuclear technology.

Burma's interest in developing a nuclear research project and reactor dates back to the 1960s, when the late dictator Ne Win authorised Burmese geologists and physicists to look for uranium in upper Burma and Kachin State. A government plane installed with uranium detection equipment combed areas in upper Burma, and promising deposits are believed to have been discovered. This doesn't indicate that Burma is in any position now to utilise its uranium for any but peaceful purposes, but the country has had its share of nutty professors and military leaders with dreams of establishing a "Fourth Burmese Empire".

The spotlight falls on Thein Oo Po Saw, a professor at Rangoon University's department of physics who studied in Moscow in the 1970s and developed close ties with Russian nuclear experts.

Thein Oo Po Saw is retired now, but he's still a senior member of the Myanmar Academy of Technicians and Scholars, and he continues to play a leading role in the regime-sponsored National Convention, which is drafting a new constitution. Interestingly, he and his intellectual group presented a suggestion in 2005 at the convention when delegates were discussing a chapter dealing with the defence of Burma.

The discussion included "conventional arms, ammunition and explosives and non-conventional sophisticated strategic arms" as well as "nuclear energy, nuclear fuel and radiation, and mineral resources that produce them, highly classified materials, objects, areas, technologies, researches and information and special security issues, accidents concerning the persons whose works involve highly classified materials, objects, areas, technologies, researches and information, and compensation and insurance cover for them in case of accidents," according to the official New Light of Myanmar.

Another "nutty professor" behind the nuclear reactor project is U Thaung, Burma's science and technology minister, who signed the reactor agreement in Moscow last week with his Russian counterpart Sergei Kiriyenko, the head of Russia's atomic agency.

An extreme nationalist who attended Burma's Defence Service Academy and served in successive Ne Win governments, Colonel Thaung later moved to the mining ministry. He visited Moscow several times since 2000 in pursuit of the deal.

Long-existing plans to develop a research reactor had been interrupted by the 1988 national uprising, and former intelligence officers who worked under General Khin Nyunt said last year that it wasn't until 1996 that Burma's Office of Strategic Studies reactivated the project.

No one was surprised by the revival of the plans, and North Korean and Russian technicians and nuclear experts were invited to Burma to give advice. U Thaung, who is close to General Than Shwe, and Thein Oo Po Saw were back in business. The search for uranium intensified.

In the early 2000s, the regime confirmed publicly that uranium deposits had been found in five areas: Magwe, Taungdwingyi, Kyaukphygon and Paongpyin in Mogok, and Kyauksin. Residents of Thabeikkyin township, 60 miles north of Mandalay, said searches were underway in the area.

Reports inside Burma say the reactor is to be built in Magwe, north of Pyi, but the regime has not disclosed the exact location. Former military intelligence officers who have seen classified documents claimed that the regime's aim in developing a nuclear reactor is to arm the country with nuclear weapons. They say facilities have been prepared at Defence Industry No (16) and No (19), located in Pyi, Pegu division.

Burma's development of its defence capability goes back to the early 1950s, when the country drew on German, Italian, Russian and Israeli assistance to give the country's armed forces the muscle it needed to deal with insurgency and civil war. Over the decades, Burma has built nearly 20 defence industries and factories in secure locations within and outside Rangoon.  While it is hard to gauge Burma's real nuclear ambitions, its shady relationship with North Korea has fuelled speculation and growing scepticism.

Last Sunday, a cargo ship from North Korea docked in Burma in what was believed to be the first port call by a North Korean ship since the two countries agreed last month to resume diplomatic relations. The Kang Nam I docked at Thilawa port, 30 kilometres south of Rangoon, seeking shelter from a storm - or so ran the official explanation for its presence.

Early last July, a dissident in exile claimed that a North Korean ship carrying a senior Korean nuclear technology expert arrived in Rangoon with a biological and nuclear package. Western intelligence sources quickly dismissed this report, however, but conceded it was possible that Burma would seek conventional arms and technology rather than high-tech long-range missiles from Pyongyang.

Burma and North Korea last month resumed the diplomatic ties that had been broken in 1983 after a bomb attack in Rangoon by North Korean terrorists on a visiting South Korean delegation headed by then-President Chun Doo-hwan.

Clandestine contacts between the two countries were re-established several years ago as Burma stepped up its search for conventional weapons.

It is easy to speculate that Burma may be seeking nuclear technology from Pyongyang, although no solid evidence has emerged so far. It is legitimate, however, to raise the issue and to inquire into the regime's intentions. Although it is premature to conclude that Burma intends to undertake the complicated and perilous process of reprocessing uranium to get weapons-grade plutonium, as things stand at the moment, strong suspicions will continue to grow. In the US, for instance, officials have long been expressing concern about the likely transfer of nuclear technology to Burma from North Korea.

The go-ahead for the nuclear reactor project and the arrival of that North Korean ship are two developments that can hardly be coincidental. If the ship, and the freighter that arrived last November, carried not only conventional weapons but plutonium and processing materials to Burma, then it can indeed be suspected that Burma plans to skip the messy process of obtaining plutonium and move straight to the production of weapons.

The presence of such a suspicion presents a security concern for regional governments and the international community at large. Developments there have to be watched very closely indeed.

Aung Zaw

Special to The Nation

Aung Zaw is the editor of The Irrawaddy.