Paul Eckert in Washington
Tuesday January 1, 2008
The Guardian

North Korea missed a year-end deadline to give a full account of its
nuclear weapons under a disarmament-for-aid deal struck with regional
powers and the US.

"It's unfortunate, but we are going to keep working on this," said a US
state department spokesman, Tom Casey.

North Korea, which tested a nuclear weapon in October 2006, gave no
explanation for missing the deadline, which had been agreed in February
in talks between the US, China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. The US,
South Korea and Japan issued coordinated statements on Sunday lamenting
Pyongyang's failure to deliver an inventory of its atomic activities in
exchange for aid.

But the US seemed to temper its disappointment. "The important thing is
not whether we have the declaration by today," said Casey. "The
important thing is we get a declaration that meets the requirement of
the agreement, which means it needs to be full and complete."

In Tokyo, a foreign ministry official urged Pyongyang "to provide a
complete and correct declaration of all its nuclear programmes as
quickly as possible".

In early November, North Korea began disabling its ageing Yongbyon
nuclear complex, which is also required under the nuclear deal. A US
official who has been at the site, north of Pyongyang, said the North
had been cooperating.

The process is the first tangible action the state has made to take
apart its arms programme since it began its quest for atomic weapons in
earnest in the 1980s.

Shortly before the deadline passed, it blamed the US for damaging
prospects for peace on the Korean peninsula by continuing to harbour an
intention to attack it, something Washington has repeatedly denied.

"The reality testifies once again that there is no change in the US
intention to invade us with force and occupy the whole of Korea,
although the US is uttering 'peace' and 'dialogue'," the North's
communist party newspaper said. "Dialogue and war attempts can't stand
together."

US officials estimate that North Korea has produced about 50kg (110lb)
of plutonium, enough for about eight nuclear weapons, and launched a
clandestine programme to enrich uranium for weapons.

Analysts said the nuclear deal would not be jeopardised for now. Early
last year North Korea missed a separate deadline without retribution to
freeze its Yongbyon reactor because of a dispute over its international
finances.

If the North meets the conditions of the six-nation deal, it will
receive 1m tonnes of heavy fuel oil or equivalent aid and Washington
will take it off its terrorism blacklist, which could help it tap into
international finance.

Zhu Feng, director of Beijing University's international security
programme, said: "There has been no strong evidence between February 13
and October 1 that North Korea has truly made up its mind to denuclearise."

He added: "None of the parties involved are convinced yet that North
Korea is really ready to denuclearise. Everyone was a bit disappointed
but agreed the situation was not too bad."

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