Call for North Korea to start dismantling nuclear arms
The US and South Korea called today on North Korea to start moving to dismantle its nuclear weapons programme now that its demand that frozen bank accounts be freed has been met.
“We certainly have confirmed that the bank accounts are open. So we have truly fulfilled our role in this and now it’s up to them,” US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill said in Seoul.
Hill said he had yet to hear a response from North Korea to the release of $25m (€19m) held in a Macau bank.
Macau authorities said earlier this week the money is available for account holders to access, but it remained unclear when North Korea might do so.
“We expect North Korea to take initial steps as the financial issue is resolved,” South Korean nuclear envoy Chun Young-woo said today before meeting Hill.
However, Chun also called for patience and said other countries should wait “another few days” until North Korea responds, noting it typically does not respond quickly.
A US presidential candidate who visited North Korea earlier this week said that it pledged to welcome UN nuclear inspectors within a day of receiving its funds, but had wanted to extend a Saturday deadline for shutting down its main nuclear reactor by 30 days.
New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson said he told the North Koreans that such a delay was unacceptable and that a reactor shutdown should take only a few days.
Chun and Hill were being joined by Victor Cha, the top White House adviser on Korea, who was in North Korea with Richardson’s delegation and met Kim Kye Gwan, the North’s main nuclear envoy.
Hill said today he would fly to Beijing tomorrow to meet Chinese officials but that he had no current plans to see North Korea’s Kim.
Diplomacy has intensified ahead of the Saturday deadline for the reactor shutdown, which would be the first move by North Korea to scale back its nuclear development since the current nuclear stand-off began in late 2002 and it expelled UN inspectors.
The move came after the US accused North Korea of embarking on a secret uranium enrichment programme in violation of a 1994 deal to stop making nuclear weapons.
The financial issue has been an obstacle to the nuclear talks, leading North Korea to boycott the negotiations for more than a year during which it exploded its first nuclear device in October.
The US blacklisted Macau’s Banco Delta Asia in 2005 for alleged complicity in counterfeiting and money laundering by North Korea.
The North later agreed to return to negotiations and pledged in February to shut down its main nuclear reactor by a Saturday deadline in exchange for a US promise to resolve the financial stand-off.
North Korea also is to receive energy aid and political concessions for eventually dismantling its nuclear programme.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the US had “gone the extra mile” to resolve the bank issue.
He repeated the US’ expectation that North Korea will meet the shutdown deadline, and refused to speculate on consequences for the North if it fails to do so.