A senior aide to the chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations committee has raised alarm over possible nuclear links between North Korea and Myanmar.

Keith Luse, a senior aide to Senator Richard Lugar, warned that U.S. policymakers must pay "special attention" to what he said was a growing relationship between the Stalinist North and the military government in Yangon.

In a list of seven key areas of concern to Lugar in Asia policy, Luse raised questions about the construction status of Myanmar's nuclear reactor.

He also questioned whether Pyongyang was selling Scud missiles to or through Myanmar.