Washington - North Korea has agreed to allow rigorous inspections of all its nuclear activities, with the United States responding by removing the Stalinist state from a terrorism blacklist, the US State Department said Saturday. The agreement was brokered after US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill travelled to Pyongyang last week in an effort to break the impasse in implementing the pact to denuclearize the country.
The process had reached a stalemate after North Korea refused to agree to a mechanism for verifying the details of all of its nuclear activities until Washington removed the country from its state sponsors of terrorism list.
But State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters on Saturday that North Korea promised to allow international inspections and come clean about its nuclear programme, including an alleged programme for enriching uranium and the proliferation of nuclear technology.
"Every element of verification that we sought is included in this package," McCormack said.
President George W Bush's administration has come under fire for dealing with North Korea because of the country's human rights violations and the threat it poses by pursuing atomic weapons. Hardline conservatives argued the agreement rewards the country for bad behaviour.
North Korea agreed to abandon its nuclear weapons programme in a 2007 pact produced by six-nation talks that also included China, Japan, Russia and South Korea after years of contentious negotiations.
The United States agreed to improve diplomatic and economic relations with North Korea in return for the commitment to disarm. The agreement also requires the United States and the other countries to provide North Korea with fuel oil and humanitarian goods.
The six-nation agreement was on the verge of collapse when North Korea resumed activities at its main nuclear facility Yongbyon last month and this week banned the UN nuclear agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), from inspecting the site.
McCormack said North Korea could once again be placed on the terrorism blacklist if it did not fulfill its obligations. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice signed the order removing North Korea from the list that also contains Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria.
The Bush administration has sought to salvage the disarmament agreement before its term ends in January. Bush announced in June US plans to remove North Korea from the list, but those plans stalled because Washington first wanted an agreement on verification.
The dispute over North Korea's nuclear programme began in October 2002, after Pyongyang admitted it has resumed atomic work in violation of a 1994 agreement with the United States.
The Bush administration backed the six-nation talks to negotiate an agreement for a North Korean commitment to abandon nuclear weapons. The negotiations have hit series of snags along the way and a final deal was not reached until after Pyongyang detonated a nuclear bomb in October 2006.
