US Designated South Korea a 'Sensitive' Country amid Nuclear Concerns

A supporter of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol holds photos during a rally to oppose his impeachment in Seoul, South Korea, Saturday, March 15, 2025. The letters read "Dismiss impeachment." (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
A supporter of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol holds photos during a rally to oppose his impeachment in Seoul, South Korea, Saturday, March 15, 2025. The letters read "Dismiss impeachment." (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
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US Designated South Korea a 'Sensitive' Country amid Nuclear Concerns

A supporter of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol holds photos during a rally to oppose his impeachment in Seoul, South Korea, Saturday, March 15, 2025. The letters read "Dismiss impeachment." (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
A supporter of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol holds photos during a rally to oppose his impeachment in Seoul, South Korea, Saturday, March 15, 2025. The letters read "Dismiss impeachment." (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

The US Department of Energy has designated ally South Korea a "sensitive" country, a spokesperson said on Friday, after the South Korean president briefly imposed martial law and amid talk of Seoul potentially developing nuclear weapons.
The administration of then-President Joe Biden put South Korea on the lowest tier of the Sensitive and Other Designated Countries List in January shortly before Biden left office, the DOE said in a written response to Reuters queries.
The department did not explain why the Asian nation was added to the list and did not indicate that President Donald Trump was inclined to reverse the measure. The spokesperson said Seoul faces no new restrictions on bilateral cooperation in science and technology.
The designation will go into effect on April 15, media reports said, according to Reuters.
South Korea's foreign ministry said the government was taking the matter seriously and in close communication with Washington.
"We will actively negotiate to ensure that there is no negative impact on energy, science and technology cooperation between South Korea and the United States," the ministry said in a statement.
The DOE list of sensitive countries includes China, Taiwan, Israel, Russia, Iran and North Korea, with Tehran and Pyongyang designated as "terrorist", according to a 2017 document posted on the department's website.
President Yoon Suk Yeol and then-Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun are among officials who raised the prospect that Seoul would be forced to pursue nuclear weapons amid fears over Pyongyang's weapons program and concerns about the US alliance.
Yoon and Kim have been indicted on charges of insurrection over Yoon's six-hour declaration of martial law in December. Yoon was impeached and his presidential powers suspended while a court decides whether to remove him from office.
Yoon backed off rhetoric about a nuclear weapons program after negotiating with Biden a 2023 agreement under which Washington is to give Seoul more insight into US planning to deter and respond to a nuclear incident in the region. In return, Seoul renewed a pledge not to pursue a nuclear bomb of its own and said it would abide by the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, which it has signed.
That, however, has not been enough to ease doubts over US defense commitments that have fueled calls for a South Korean nuclear arsenal.
Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yul said last month that nuclear weapons were not "off the table", though it was premature to talk about such a plan.
"Given that international situations are developing in unpredictable directions, this is a principled response that we must prepare for all possible scenarios," Cho told a parliamentary hearing.
Daryl Kimball, executive director of the nonprofit Arms Control Association, said that in light of such "provocative" statements, South Korea is a proliferation risk and the DOE was prudent to put the country on its list.
"Listing the ROK as a proliferation-sensitive country should rule out any chance of a South Korean request for US approval to enrich uranium and reprocessing spent fuel... to produce nuclear weapons," Kimball said, citing the country's formal name, the Republic of Korea.
The handling of the designation raised concerns in Seoul. Cho told parliament on Tuesday that his ministry had had no formal communication from the Biden administration and only heard about the possible designation from an informal tip-off.
Countries may appear on the Energy Department's list for reasons of national security, nuclear nonproliferation or support for terrorism, though inclusion does not necessarily indicate an adversarial relationship with the United States.
"Currently there are no new restrictions on bilateral science and technology cooperation with the ROK," the DOE said. "The Energy Department looks forward to collaborating with the ROK to advance our mutual interests."
Though the designation does not prohibit scientific or technical cooperation, visits to the listed countries and cooperation undergo an internal review beforehand, the department said.



Doctor Deported to Lebanon Had Photos ‘Sympathetic’ to Hezbollah on Phone, US Says

A general view of The John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse in Boston, Massachusetts, US, July 27, 2021. REUTERS/Nicholas Pfosi/File Photo
A general view of The John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse in Boston, Massachusetts, US, July 27, 2021. REUTERS/Nicholas Pfosi/File Photo
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Doctor Deported to Lebanon Had Photos ‘Sympathetic’ to Hezbollah on Phone, US Says

A general view of The John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse in Boston, Massachusetts, US, July 27, 2021. REUTERS/Nicholas Pfosi/File Photo
A general view of The John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse in Boston, Massachusetts, US, July 27, 2021. REUTERS/Nicholas Pfosi/File Photo

US authorities on Monday said they deported a Rhode Island doctor to Lebanon last week after discovering "sympathetic photos and videos" of the former longtime leader of Hezbollah and its fighters in her cell phone's deleted items folder.

Alawieh had also told agents that while in Lebanon she attended the funeral last month of Hezbollah's slain leader Hassan Nasrallah, whom she supported from a "religious perspective" as a Shiite.

The US Department of Justice provided those details as it sought to assure a federal judge in Boston that US Customs and Border Protection did not willfully disobey an order he issued on Friday that should have halted Dr. Rasha Alawieh's immediate removal.

The 34-year-old Lebanese citizen, who held an H-1B visa, was detained on Thursday at Logan International Airport in Boston after returning from a trip to Lebanon to see family. Her cousin then filed a lawsuit seeking to halt her deportation.

In its first public explanation for her removal, the Justice Department said Alawieh, a kidney specialist and assistant professor at Brown University, was denied re-entry to the United States based on what CBP found on her phone and statements she made during an airport interview.

"It's a purely religious thing," she said about the funeral, according to a transcript of that interview reviewed by Reuters. "He's a very big figure in our community. For me it's not political."

Western governments including the United States designate Hezbollah a terrorist group. The Lebanese armed group is part of the "Axis of Resistance", an alliance of Iran-backed groups across the Middle East that also includes the Palestinian movement Hamas, which sparked the Gaza war by attacking Israel almost a year ago on Oct. 7.

Based on those statements and the discovery of photos on her phone of Nasrallah and Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran, the Justice Department said CBP concluded "her true intentions in the United States could not be determined."

Alawieh and a lawyer for her cousin did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

In Monday's filing, the Justice Department also defended CBP officials against claims by the cousin's legal team that Alawieh was flown out of the country on Friday evening in violation of an order issued by US District Judge Leo Sorokin that day.

The judge had issued an order barring Alawieh's removal from Massachusetts without 48 hours' notice. Yet she was put onto a flight to France that night and is now back in Lebanon.

The judge on Sunday had directed the government to address "serious allegations" that his order was willfully violated ahead of a hearing that had been scheduled for Monday.

That hearing was canceled on Monday at the request of the cousin's lone remaining attorney, after lawyers at the law firm Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer representing her pro bono withdrew, citing "further diligence" about the quickly-moving case.

A lawyer with that firm said she had gone to the airport on Friday and shown a CBP officer a copy of Sorokin's order on her laptop before Alawieh's Air France flight departed, and another CBP official in a declaration on Monday said he was made aware that occurred before taking Alawieh to the boarding area.

But the Justice Department said the notification needed to be received through standard channels and be received by the agency's legal counsel for their review and guidance, which did not happen.

"CBP takes court orders seriously and strives to always abide by a court order," Justice Department attorneys wrote.

The Justice Department's filing was later sealed by Sorokin at the request of a lawyer for the cousin. Reuters reviewed it from a public terminal in the courthouse before access was further restricted.