The Science and Technology Ministry has denied an AFP report that the International Atomic Energy Agency is probing if Seoul will make weapons-grade plutonium at a Daejeon facility.

The ministry said Tuesday that the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute is building a lab to develop a method to drastically reduce the volume and caloric value of nuclear fuel, something which has nothing to do with weapons proliferation.

Under an international agreement, the government said that it submitted to the IAEA a blueprint for the plan and that the agency's inspectors found nothing wrong in their field inspection in August and September.