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WORLD / Asia-Pacific
UN nuke team: N.Korea cooperative
(AP)
Updated: 2007-07-31 10:57
BEIJING - North Korea has cooperated fully with a team UN nuclear experts
who were monitoring the shutdown and sealing of the country's sole
plutonium-producing reactor, the leader of the team said Tuesday.
The International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) inspection team chief
Adel Tolba speaks to journalists in this image from television, Tuesday,
July 31, 2007, as he departs from Pyongyang airport in North Korea.? [AP]
The 10-member International Atomic Energy Agency team went to North Korea
on July 12 to supervise the closing of the Yongbyon reactor, the key
component of North Korea's nuclear program.
"We have a full cooperation with the DPRK authorities," Adel Tolba told
broadcaster APTN. The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is the formal
name of North Korea.
"We finished what was planned. Assessment will be done in Vienna," Tolba
said on his departure from Pyongyang airport.
Tolba's team has been replaced by a second six-member IAEA team that
arrived in Pyongyang on Saturday.
The IAEA confirmed last week that North Korea had shut down its sole
functioning reactor at Yongbyon - the first tangible progress after years
of negotiations involving the US and other regional powers.
IAEA inspectors also are working to verify the status of two unfinished
reactors, a spent fuel reprocessing facility and a fuel fabrication plant.
North Korea exploded a test nuclear weapon in October, but four months
later agreed to scrap its nuclear program in exchange for economic and
political concessions in a deal with the US, Russia, China, Japan and
South Korea.
It will eventually receive the equivalent of a total of 1 million tons
for disabling its nuclear facilities under a February agreement with the
five countries.
North Korea has begun receiving oil from South Korea as a reward for
shutting down Yongbyon, which is located 60 miles north of Pyongyang.
The shutdown is the first step North Korea has taken to scale back its
nuclear ambitions since the crisis began in late 2002.
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