The Ukraine claimed it caught two North Korean spies six years ago who were hunting for missiles technology that would help the isolated communist country develop long-range weapons that could hit the United States.
Ukraine made the claims in a report by analysts at Britain's International Institute of Strategic Studies on Aug. 14, CNN reported. Ukrainian officials have been trying to beat back charges that North Korea was able to make advances in its intercontinental missile technology from stolen plan from or information originating from the Ukraine.
The Ukraine and Russia have pointed fingers at each other as the link to North Korea's improved long-range missiles capabilities, CNN said.
Ukrainian officials gave the cable network 2011 surveillance footage and details of a sting operation it carried out to capture two reported North Korean spies.
The IISS report said two North Korean nationals were arrested and convicted in 2012 for attempting to receive missile hardware from Yuzhnoye (Design Office in Dnipro).
"Today, Yuzhnoye’s facilities lie close to the front lines of the Russian-controlled secessionist territory," the report said. "Clearly, there is no shortage of potential routes through which North Korea might have acquired the few dozen RD-250 engines that would be needed for an ICBM program."
In July, North Korea claimed it had successfully conducted its first test of an intercontinental ballistic missile, marking the closest the secluded regime has come to making a missile with the capability of striking the U.S. mainland strengthening its hand in negotiations with Washington, The Guardian reported.
North Korean state-run television said at the time that the missile had reached an altitude longer and higher than any of its previous tests.
The IISS report suggested that North Korea had to have outside help in improving its technology.
"… The technical skills needed to modify the existing RD-250 turbopump, or fashioning a new one capable of feeding propellant to a single chamber would reside with experts with a rich history of working with the RD-250," the report stated. "Such expertise is available at Russia's Energomash concern and Ukraine's KB Yuzhnoye. One has to conclude that the modified engines were made in those factories."