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NKorea pledges nuclear shutdown
when banking row is settled
Declan McCullagh
CNet
Saturday April 21, 2007
North Korea Friday repeated promises to start shutting down its
nuclear programme once a banking dispute is settled, as South Korea
pondered when to resume crucial rice aid to its impoverished neighbour.
In its second such message in a week, the communist state pledged
to invite UN atomic agency inspectors the moment it can confirm
that its funds, which had been frozen in a Macau bank, have been
unblocked.
A multinational agreement on scrapping the nuclear programme is
in limbo because of the dispute over the 25 million dollars in Banco
Delta Asia (BDA).
The US Treasury blacklisted BDA in September 2005, alleging that
some of the North Korean accounts there contained the proceeds of
money-laundering and counterfeiting.
In an effort to make progress on the nuclear issue, Washington
announced last week the money is available for collection or transfer.
But foreign banks are reluctant to accept the transferred cash for
fear of being tainted by suspect money.
Friday's Korean Central News Agency report appeared to suggest
some progress had been made.
The issue has "not yet been completely settled," it said,
quoting a message sent Friday by Ri Je-Son, head of North Korea's
atomic energy department, to International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei.
"Working negotiations are now brisk between a DPRK (North
Korea) bank and (BDA) to settle the issue," the message said.
As soon as there is confirmation the funds are available, IAEA
inspectors would be invited to discuss "suspending the operation"
of the Yongbyon reactor.
The North committed itself to shutting down and sealing Yongbyon
in the presence of IAEA inspectors, under the first phase of a February
13 six-nation disarmament pact.
The reactor produces the raw material for plutonium, used to make
bombs, one of which was tested by the North last October.
Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun said Thursday that a portion of the North
Korean money has been wired to an unidentified bank in southeast
Asia as a test to see if the transaction can be successful.
If so, it will take more than a month to finish transferring all
the funds from the 52 accounts involved, the newspaper quoted a
source as saying. There was no confirmation of the report.
In Pyongyang, North and South Korea were holding a third day of
talks on rice aid and joint economic projects.
The meeting followed a stormy session Thursday, when North Korea's
chief delegate briefly walked out after the South called on its
neighbour to start denuclearising.
The North, which admits it faces a one-million-ton food shortfall
this year, wants an unconditional commitment from the South to provide
an annual 400,000 tons of rice aid. It says political issues should
not be raised at the economic talks.
Press reports have said Seoul may link rice to progress on denuclearisation
after the North missed an April 14 deadline to start the process
because of the BDA row.
However, pool reports from Pyongyang quoted an unidentified South
Korean official as saying the rice aid would not become contentious
because it was already agreed upon during a ministerial meeting
in March.
Seoul suspended its regular annual shipment of 400,000 tons of
rice after the North's missile tests last July. Relations soured
further after its October nuclear test but improved when the North
returned to six-nation nuclear disarmament talks.
The South agreed in principle in March to restart the rice shipments
but did not fix a date for the resumption.
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