The United States and China are gearing up to provide 100,000 tons of heavy fuel oil to North Korea as part of the nuclear deal under the six-party talks, news reports said yesterday.

China will be the first to send its shipment of 50,000 tons to the North by as soon as the end of the month, to be followed by the United States who will supply the remaining amount, news reports said.

U.S. President George W. Bush"s administration notified Congress on Tuesday "of its intent to provide 25 million dollars which would cover the third tranche shipment of 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil to North Korea," according to an AFP report.

The U.S. government must report any plans for aid to North Korea to the legislature, based on the current sanctions against the communist regime.

The six-party talks are slated to resume next week. They will aim to line up North Korea"s disablement steps with the corresponding economic and political incentives one-by-one.

The reports of Washington and Beijing"s plans lightened the atmosphere ahead of multinational negotiations to be held in Beijing.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack on Thursday confirmed the administration"s notification to Congress, saying "this is something that is done with an eye toward if North Korea does in fact follow through on their commitment.

"So what it does is that it prepares us for the case that we do need to fulfill some commitment as part of the six party talks," he told reporters.

The oil aid is part of the 1 million tons of heavy fuel oil promised to North Korea in exchange for the declaration and disablement of its nuclear programs at the Feb. 13 agreement.

South Korea has completed the delivery of the first 50,000 tons batch of the oil to the country in August.

Some of the 1 million tons of oil are likely to be replaced with other types of energy or infrastructure as the North only has a monthly storage capacity of 50,000 tons.

A team of American, Chinese and Russian nuclear experts, in the meantime, completed their survey around the main nuclear sites in Yongbyon and returned to Pyongyang yesterday.

Sung Kim, chief Korea expert for the U.S. State Department, who headed the team, was quoted telling broadcaster APTN that the survey was "useful."

He declined further comment saying he had to report to superiors first. Other experts refused to comment.

The experts sat with North Korean officials upon their return to Pyongyang to discuss how to disable the facilities.

McCormack said the delegation"s mission was complete and that they "received full cooperation. They saw everything they wanted to see."

Returning to the fuel aid issue, McCormack also said that although preparation is being made the actual delivery still hinges on North Korea"s commitment.

"If North Korea does in fact follow through on their commitments as stated, under the understanding of that phase two commitment, then the other parties have some commitments," he said. "This would be part of the U.S. fulfilling that commitment, although it"s not done yet."

Along with the energy aid, the United States is to lift sanctions posed against North Korea as part of the normalization of relations.

Under the now-defunct Agreed Framework in 1994, the United States annually sent 500,000 tons of heavy fuel oil to the North. But the shipment was halted in 2002 upon allegations that Pyongyang was running clandestine uranium-based weapons programs.


By Lee Joo-hee


(angiely@heraldm.com)






2007.09.15