Embassy of the United States

U.S. - North Korea

U.S. Removes North Korea from State Sponsors of Terrorism List   The cooling tower at North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear complex was destroyed in June.   North Korea agrees to comply with nuclear verification requirements By Merle D. Kellerhals Jr. Staff Writer October 14, 2008 Washington — The United States removed North Korea from its list of state sponsors of terrorism after the North Korean government agreed to resume dismantling a plutonium processing plant at Yongbyon and to allow international inspectors. “North Korea has stated it will resume disablement of its nuclear facilities. This demonstrates that the Six Party principle of action for action is working,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said at an October 11 Washington briefing. “The secretary of state this morning [October 11] rescinded the designation of the DPRK [North Korea] as a state sponsor of terrorism, and that was effective with her signature.” North Korea had made getting off the state sponsors list a critical part of its negotiations in the Six-Party Talks, which include China, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Russia and the United States.  The negotiations are aimed at removing nuclear weapons from the Korean Peninsula. President Bush had insisted that for North Korea to be removed from the list of state sponsors, it had to comply fully with verification requirements established by the Six-Party Talks. Satisfied with North Korea's compliance, Bush approved the action October 10 after many days of intense debate in Washington and in consultations with the negotiating partners. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice signed the order to remove North Korea from the list the next day. North Korea had been on the list since 1987 after the bombing of a South Korean passenger jet. Cuba, Iran, Syria and Sudan remain on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list. On October 13, North Korea lifted its ban on U.N. inspections of the Yongbyon plutonium-producing facility it used to develop a nuclear test explosion. North Korean officials announced that they will continue deactivating a linked facility within days, the International Atomic Energy Agency said in Vienna, Austria. “The agency inspectors were informed today that as of 14 October 2008, core discharge activities at the [nuclear] reactor would be resumed,” the IAEA said in a brief statement.  IAEA inspectors, who were staying at a guest house in Yongbyon, were permitted to resume inspections, the agency said. Yongbyon is approximately 60 miles [96 kilometers] north of the capital at Pyongyang. It has three main facilities — a five-megawatt nuclear reactor, a plutonium reprocessing plant and a nuclear fuel fabrication complex, according to the IAEA. The reactor facility is located along the Churyong River and is about a mile long. “Every element of verification that we sought is included in this package,” McCormack said. The United States had pledged to remove North Korea from the terrorism list if it would provide a verification plan for Six-Party Talks approval, McCormack said. During a three-day period at the beginning of October, chief U.S. negotiator Christopher Hill worked out an agreement with the North Korean negotiators, he said. According to the terms of the agreement: • Experts from the six parties may participate in the verification process, including experts from non-nuclear states. • The IAEA will have an important consultative and support role in verification. • Experts will have access to all declared facilities, and based on mutual consent, to undeclared sites. • Scientific procedures, including sampling and forensic activities, will be used during inspections. • All measures contained in the verification protocol will apply to the plutonium-based program and any uranium enrichment and proliferation activities. Assistant Secretary of State Patricia McNerney said the verification process would not be without problems. “Going into verification with North Korea will not be easy, we know that,” she said during the briefing.  “This is the most secret and opaque regime in the world.” In addition, the monitoring mechanism already devised by the six parties to monitor compliance with the six-party documents applies to proliferation and uranium enrichment activities, McCormack said. McCormack said this agreement and unspecified “associated understandings” have been sent to the other members of the Six-Party Talks, and they will serve as a baseline for a verification protocol to be completed and approved by the six parties. In addition, McCormack said, “We strongly urge North Korea to address Japan's concerns without further delay” on the abductions of Japanese citizens during the 1970s and 1980s. “We have not forgotten and will never forget the suffering of the abductees and their families,” McCormack said. According to Ambassador Sung Kim, the U.S. special envoy to the Six-Party Talks, the parties have agreed that the full nuclear declaration from North Korea would be subject to a full verification protocol. “We have been talking to the Chinese, and I think the Chinese would like to call a meeting as soon as possible, possibly within this month, to finalize and adopt this verification package,” he said at the October 11 Washington briefing.  China chairs the multilateral talks. McCormack also said North Korea remains subject to numerous other sanctions not covered by the state sponsors of terrorism list resulting from its 2006 nuclear test, its proliferation activities with other nations, its human rights violations and its status as a communist state.