N. Korea Shuts Down Yongbyon Reactor:US

By Chae Hee-mook

Staff Reporter

North Korea has shut down its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, the U.S. Department of State reported Saturday.

"The U.S. has been informed Saturday that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea shut down its nuclear facilities at Yongbyon," the department said. The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is the official name of North Korea.

"We welcome this development and look forward to the verification and monitoring of this shutdown by the International Atomic Energy Agency team that has arrived in DPRK," spokesman Sean McCormack said in a statement.

North Korea has committed itself to its promise made on July 6 that it would consider suspending the operation of its nuclear facilities as soon as it receives the first shipment of heavy oil from the South under the Feb. 13 six-way deal for shutdown of the nuclear reactor in return for aid.

A South Korean tanker with 6,200 tons of fuel oil arrived at the Port of Seonbong on the northeastern coast of the North early Saturday, the South Korean Unification Ministry said

earlier that day.

This is part of the 50,000 tons of heavy oil South Korea has promised to send to the North in four installments by Aug. 1.

"We look forward to working with all parties to make rapid progress in implementing the next phase set forth in the February 13 agreement on initial actions, in which the DPRK has committed to declaring all its nuclear programs and disabling all its existing nuclear facilities," McCormack said.

"We, along with all our other six-party partners, remain firmly committed to achieving the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula through the implementation of the September 2005 Joint Statement. With the six-party talks negotiators set to meet July 18 in Beijing," he noted.

The six nations are South and North Korea, the United States, China, Russia and Japan.

Kim Myong-kil, deputy chief of the North Korean mission to the United Nations in New York, confirmed that North Korea notified the United States of shutting down its nuclear facilities at Yongbyong.

"The shutdown came at a time when the first shipment of 6,200 tons of heavy fuel oil arrived in the North," Kim told the U.S.government-funded radio station, the Voice of America (VOA), in a phone interview on Saturday in Washington time. "The next step will be to disable the facilities."

Meanwhile, Seoul has welcomed Pyongyang's reported shutdown of its plutonium-producing nuclear reactor, saying that it would take some time to verify the shutdown and sealing of the nuclear facilities at Yeongbyeon, about 90 kilometers north of the capital.

"The suspension of operations fulfills the North's earlier promise to halt operations of the Yongbyon facilities upon the arrival of the first shipment of heavy oil," Yonhap news agency quoted an official at the Foreign Ministry in Seoul as saying.

The official said the actual shutdown may take more time, saying the process would be completed only when verified by U.N. nuclear monitors and the facilities are sealed.

"And this could take about two weeks," the official was quoted as saying

In another development, inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency will start verifying whether North Korea had actually shut down its nuclear facilities in Yongbyon on Sunday morning, the top U.S. nuclear negotiator said in Japan early Sunday.

''What the IAEA said was 'Our boys start verification tomorrow morning' -- which is today,'' Kyodo News Service quoted Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill as saying in the town of Hakone, Kanagawa Prefecture, where he is staying.

''So they begin to verify (the Yongbyon facilities) today'' whether the facilities have indeed been shut down, Hill said, adding that he was informed that the North had shut down the facilities in Yongbyon on Saturday afternoon.