North Korea rejects US request to take samples to verify its nuclear accounting
SEOUL, South Korea
North Korea said Wednesday it will not allow outside inspectors to take samples from its main nuclear complex to verify the communist regime's accounting of past nuclear activities.
Pyongyang's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it never agreed to such sampling, contradicting statements by U.S. officials last month following a breakthrough deal about how to verify a list of nuclear programs submitted by North Korea in June under a disarmament pact.
The North's conflicting statements could prove a new snag in the long, tortured process of nuclear disarmament on the Korean peninsula. North Korea has agreed to give up its nuclear weapons but has bickered with the U.S. over verification, with Washington insisting on strict measures to ensure Pyongyang is not hiding any active atomic programs.
South Korean Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan said Thursday that the North's latest refusal could be a ploy to secure more aid for the deeply impoverished country.
North Korea has always "created a small crisis before resolving a certain issue, and received something in the process of resolving it," Yu said.
U.S. officials said last month that North Korea had agreed to allow atomic experts to take samples and conduct forensic tests at all of its declared nuclear facilities and undeclared sites on mutual consent.
Sample-taking is believed to be a key means of nuclear verification.
Yu said that South Korean nuclear envoy Kim Sook and his U.S. counterpart Christopher Hill discussed ways to deal with the North's latest move during a telephone conversation earlier Thursday.
He did not give further details but said that the U.S and North Korea should hold additional negotiations over the dispute.
On Wednesday, the North's Foreign Ministry said last month's deal with Washington calls only for letting nuclear inspectors visit its main atomic complex, view related documents and interview scientists - but it said taking samples was never part of the deal.
Pyongyang also said only its Yongbyon atomic complex is subject to verification, and inspections can take place only after it receives all energy aid promised from its negotiating partners - China, Japan, South Korea, the United States and Russia.
"It is an act of infringing upon sovereignty little short of seeking a house-search ... to insist on adding even a word except the written agreement reached between" the two countries, said the statement carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency.
State Department spokesman Robert Wood contradicted the North's claims that it never agreed to allow outside inspectors to take samples.
"I'm not able to tell you what the North Koreans are thinking," Wood said; but it had been "agreed that experts could take samples and remove them from the country for testing."
"We want everybody to adhere to their obligations," Wood added.
South Korea called the North's statement "disappointing."
"There should be a thorough verification that can confirm the correctness and completeness of the declaration North Korea submitted," Seoul's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
In February 2007, North Korea agreed to disable Yongbyon and declare all its nuclear programs as a step toward their ultimate dismantlement. In exchange, the impoverished communist nation was promised energy aid worth 1 million tons of fuel oil and other concessions, including removal from the U.S. terrorism list.
In Wednesday's statement, the North also complained about a delay in energy aid shipment, saying it has slowed disabling the Yongbyon nuclear reactor in response.
About half of the promised aid has been provided so far, while the North has completed eight of 11 required steps to disable the nuclear complex. Pyongyang has claimed the pace of energy shipment does not match that of its disabling work.