 Pyongyang to give nuke report this week: Kyodo
(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-06-24 07:45 The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) will hand over a long-delayed report of its nuclear activities on Thursday in a step towards disarmament, Kyodo news agency said in a report from Beijing yesterday, citing sources close to Six-Party Talks on the issue. In response, the United States will begin the process of removing Pyongyang from a list of nations Washington sees as sponsors of terrorism, the report said, a move that would ease trade sanctions. Last week, the US envoy to Six-Party Talks on Pyongyang's nuclear weapons, Christopher Hill, expressed hope that the DPRK would turn in the documents soon, paving the way for a resumption of stalled disarmament talks. Pyongyang shocked the world by testing a nuclear device in October 2006. The six-party process, involving China, the Republic of Korea, Russia and Japan as well as the DPRK and the United States, was set up to negotiate nuclear disarmament in return for improved diplomatic ties and economic aid. Pyonyang had agreed to produce the report on its nuclear programs by the end of last year. Japan's Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura had been set to urge US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to be cautious about removing the DPRK from the terrorism list at a meeting in Kyoto on Friday, but the process will likely have started by that time, Kyodo said. Foreign TV stations invited Earlier yesterday, Korean media reported that Pyongyang wants to invite five foreign news companies to record the destruction of the cooling tower at its ageing nuclear complex in a show of its will to abide by the disarmament deal. Korean officials said the event would take place at the DPRK's Yongbyon nuclear complex, about 100 km north of Pyongyang. The ROK's chief nuclear negotiator Kim Sook said on Sunday that five broadcasters - each from the five countries in the Six-Party Talks - had been asked to cover the planned blowing up of the cooling tower at Yongbyon. Kim said CNN was chosen as US broadcaster, but did not name the other four stations. Pyongyang also has notified the five stations of a date for the tower's destruction, Kim said, without elaborating. The DPRK's move indicates a breakthrough is imminent in the impasse that has held up the six-party nuclear negotiations for months, since the tower's destruction is supposed to come only after Pyongyang submits its long-delayed list of nuclear programs. The DPRK agreed last year to disable its nuclear facilities and fully account for its nuclear programs in exchange for economic and political concessions. The denuclearization process reached an impasse as Pyongyang failed to meet an end-of-2007 deadline for declaring its nuclear activities, although the DPRK has made progress in disabling its nuclear facilities so they cannot be easily restarted. Kim said the DPRK is expected to present the nuclear declaration "soon" but declined to specify a date. The cooling tower's destruction - a symbolic act designed to show Pyongyang's intent to abandon its nuclear ambitions - is part of a series of carefully sequenced reciprocal moves that Pyongyang and Washington agreed to take to move the nuclear talks forward. Once the DPRK submits a nuclear declaration, the US government is supposed to begin the process of taking Pyongyang off Washington's terrorism and sanctions blacklists. Next would come the DPRK's destruction of the cooling tower, which is supposed be followed by a resumption of six-nation nuclear talks. US officials said all of these developments could happen within the next 10 days while Rice is in or en route to Japan, the ROK and China this week. Agencies (China Daily 06/24/2008 page11) |
