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SEOUL : North Korea is almost ready to deliver a full accounting of its nuclear activities under a major disarmament deal but wants to link the timing to US concessions, Seoul's top negotiator said Sunday.
Kim Sook, who spoke with his North Korean counterpart in Beijing last week, said Pyongyang was waiting for the green light that Washington would take the communist nation off a list of states that sponsor terrorism.
"North Korea was preparing to submit a nuclear declaration, and I could confirm it was almost completed," Kim Sook told reporters of his first formal talks with Pyongyang's top nuclear envoy Kim Kye-Gwan two days ago.
The North was supposed to have handed over a full declaration of all its nuclear activities by December 31 last year under a deal with its negotiating partners China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States.
But disputes over the declaration have blocked the start of the final phase of the disarmament process -- the permanent dismantling of its nuclear plants and surrender of all atomic material.
The North's envoy said Washington and Pyongyang should act simultaneously, Kim Sook reported, adding that both sides were trying to adjust the timing.
"In my view, the US needs more time and North Korea has almost done its preparations," added Kim Sook, who also met in Moscow last week with his US counterpart Christopher Hill.
US experts are still scrutinising 18,000 pages of documents that Pyongyang presented last month in a prelude to its formal declaration.
The New York Times reported Saturday that in the documents, the reclusive regime acknowledged that it had produced 37 kilogrammes of plutonium -- less than the 40 to 50 kilos US intelligence officials had calculated but more than the 30 kilos Pyongyang originally admitted having.
Under the February 2007 disarmament deal, North Korea agreed to disable its key Yongbyon nuclear facility in exchange for aid and diplomatic recognition.
Hill, speaking Friday in Moscow, hailed progress in the six-nation talks, saying Pyongyang was preparing the overdue declaration.
- AFP/ir
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