By Yoon Won-sup
Staff Reporter
The upcoming six-party talks slated for Sept. 27-30 in Beijing have good prospects to produce another agreement for concrete ways on the disablement and declaration of nuclear facilities in North Korea.
This is backed by the fact that the main negotiators at the talks have already agreed on core principles. In addition, nuclear experts inspected the facilities in order to draw up a technical roadmap.
Early this month, top negotiators of the United States and North Korea tentatively agreed to the disablement and declaration within this year in a meeting in Geneva. In return, Washington will remove Pyongyang from its list of terror-sponsoring states and rescind the application of the Trading with the Enemy Act.
It is assumed that the talks will be considered successful if they contain what the two sides agreed to early in September.
Last month, a team of nuclear experts from the United States, China and Russia visited nuclear facilities in Yongbyon and agreed on a detailed draft for their disablement with North Korea, according to government officials.
The draft will be discussed at the talks, which involve the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia.
Lim Sung-nam, South Korea's No. 2 nuclear negotiator, said talks between North Korea and a U.S.-led team of nuclear experts were positive after a briefing from the experts following their five-day trip to North Korea.
``The talks between the United States and the North were conducted in a businesslike manner with a very positive atmosphere,'' Lim told reporters. ``Additional consultations and a decision are expected at the six-party talks.''
Though there is some disagreement on technical matters, this will be ironed out, according to government officials.
It also appears there has been considerable progress in discussions between Pyongyang and Washington about a uranium enrichment program (UEP), which was the biggest stumbling block to the talks.
At the Geneva talks, North Korea admitted for the first time that it had acquired from a third country some of the aluminum parts for uranium enrichment.
North Korea shut down the Yongbyon nuclear complex in July in return for economic aid and political concessions as a first step for denuclearization under an agreement reached on Feb. 13, 2007.
In return for the disablement and declaration of its nuclear programs _ the second phase of denuclearization _ North Korea will receive 950,000 tons of heavy fuel oils or the equivalent in aid as agreed to in February.