New York - North Korea Saturday formally charged that it is rebuilding its nuclear plant because the United States made additional demands and broke an agreement to delist its country as a state sponsor of terrorism. Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs Pak Kil Yon denounced the US as "the worst peace breaker and human rights violator in the world" as evidenced by US invasions of sovereign countries and massacre of innocent people, a reference to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Pak's vitriolic attacks against the US, Japan and South Korea were delivered to the UN General Assembly. He informed the 192-nation body of Pyongyang's decision to rebuild its nuclear facilities after it made headlines during the summer by blowing up some of the buildings at the plant.
The dismantling of the nuclear plant north of the capital Pyongyang was carried out after talks mediated by China resulted in Washington's agreeing to provide economic assistance and remove North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism.
Last week, North Korea asked the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to remove its seals from the nuclear facilities and asked IAEA inspectors to leave the country.
Earlier this week, North Korea informed the Vienna-based IAEA that it planned to restart plutonium reprocessing next week, ending the nuclear freeze that was part of a 6-country agreement.
"Now that the US has broken the agreement, the People's Democratic Republic of Korea is unevitably taking relevant countermeasures on the basis of the principle of 'action for action'," Pak said.
He was Pyongyang's UN ambassador before returning home this past spring to become vice foreign minister.
He said his country's nuclear facilities had been in the "final stage" of being disabled when the US put what he called "artificial obstacles" in the path of the agreement reached by the six-party negotiations led by China.
Washington insists that a deal must first be reached on a process to verify North Korea has fully revealed all aspects of its nuclear programme before removing the Stalinist state from its terrorism blacklist.
Pak insisted that the verification demands were never part of the agreement by the six-party talks that included South Korea, Japan, Russia and China.
"This is little short of admitting that the list is not related to terrorism in actuality," Pak said.
"If the six parties are not true to their words in implementing respective obligations in the light of a great lack of trust with each other, no progress will be made at all," Pak declared.
But he said that North Korea will continue to work for the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula. He warned that his government will not be indifferent to offenses against its dignity and sovereignty.
He said relations with South Korea have worsened since a new government was installed in Seoul this year. He claimed Seoul has reneged on previous agreements to advance inter-Korean dialogue and to improve diplomatic ties.
Turning to Japan, Pak said it cannot become a permanent member of the UN Security Council because Japan has never admitted crimes committed during the Japanese occupation of Korea and World War II.
