Hwang Jang-Yop, a former secretary of the ruling Workers Party of Korea, said the reclusive nation signed a pact with Pakistan in 1996 on the transfer of uranium-based nuclear technology.

"North Korea reprocessed half of its 1,800 fuel rods in 1993," he added in a lecture in Seoul, according to the Yonhap news agency.

Hwang, who defected to South Korea in 1997 during a visit to China, said the North's declared nuclear test on Monday was ordered by leader Kim Jong-Il to "raise his status."

"It is also aimed at stunning the world and encouraging left-wing forces here (in the South)," he added.

Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf denied Wednesday that proliferation by his country's disgraced nuclear supremo allowed North Korea to carry out its nuclear test.

He also said neither the government nor the army had helped scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, who has admitted passing nuclear secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya.

"This (North Korean) bomb is a plutonium bomb. We do not have a plutonium bomb. That should indicate to you whether we are responsible or not," Musharraf said.

US and South Korean experts have previously said the North is believed to have produced enough weapons-grade plutonium to make several crude nuclear bombs.

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