Politics

17:36, 13.09.2007 | APR

North Korea has given full access to experts from the United States, Russia and China on a rare visit to the reclusive nation to examine ways to disable its nuclear weapons programme, the State Department said on Wednesday.

"They saw everything they had asked to see," said department spokesman Sean McCormack after the experts began surveying key nuclear facilities on Wednesday.
The main task is to check on the Yongbyon nuclear complex, which Pyongyang closed down in July as part of a February multilateral agreement, and decide the most effective way of shutting down the plants permanently.
McCormack said that the team would visit the rest of the Yongbyon facilities on Thursday before returning to Pyongyang for talks ahead of their departure Friday.
They would then report back to the next session of six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear ambitions expected next week, which involve the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia .
After over four years of stalemate, the North agreed in February to declare and disable its nuclear programme in return for aid, security guarantees and major diplomatic benefits.
In July it shut down its only operating reactor at Yongbyon in return for 50,000 tonnes of fuel oil.
The International Atomic Energy Agency in August confirmed the shutdown, along with the closure of a nuclear fuel fabrication plant, a reprocessing plant and a separate 50-megawatt reactor, only partly built, at Yongbyon.
In addition, a 200-megawatt reactor under construction at Taechon was shut.
The next step is to disable the facilities by encasing them in concrete or some other method - something the experts will advise on.
- AFP/de