Seoul - North Korea and the United States are closer to a compromise in a last-ditch effort to salvage a nuclear disarmament deal, South Korean media said Friday. Both sides were ready for concessions in the disputed question of verification and inspection procedures of Pyongyang9s nuclear facilities, the Chosun Ilbo newspapers said, quoting a high-ranking South Korean government official.
While the North indicated willingness to continue work to disable its nuclear weapons facilities, the United States could tentatively remove the country from its terrorism blacklist earlier than planned.
A deal on this was cut during talks between North Korea and chief US nuclear negotiator Christopher Hill last week in Pyongyang, the paper said. US President George W Bush still has to give his assent.
South Korean Foreign Minister Yu Myung Hwan cautioned, however, that "no final decision" had been made regarding verifying Pyongyang's disarmament claims.
Yu indicated that Washington might accept partial verification, focusing on the North's declared plutonium programme at Yongbyon and leaving questions about an alleged uranium enrichment programme and the country's proliferation activities for later.
North Korea9s resuming the disabling and the US delisting could come as early as this month, the official was quoted as saying.
The communist state Thursday banned UN inspectors from accessing its nuclear facilities, after announcing in late September it would restart the Yongbyon nuclear complex, a reaction to the US refusal to remove North Korea from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.
The United States had made proper verification of the North9s declaration of nuclear facilities and stockpiles a prerequisite for delisting.
North Korea disabled essential parts of is nuclear weapons programme after an accord reached with the United States, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia in February 2007, in exchange for substantive aid assurances.
