Envoy: North Korea disablement coming

A team of U.S. experts is expected to begin disabling North Korea's nuclear facilities on Monday, the U.S. envoy to disarmament talks with Pyongyang said. If carried out, it would mark the biggest step the communist country has taken to scale back its atomic program.

Envoy Christopher Hill also said Saturday that the North — one of the world's most isolated countries — appeared to be opening up, and said U.S. lawyers had begun working with Pyongyang to remove the communist regime from Washington's list of countries sponsoring terrorism.

"By Monday morning, they will begin their work," Hill said, referring to the U.S. team that arrived in Pyongyang on Thursday. "It's a very big day because it's the first time it's actually going to start disabling its nuclear program."

The North shut down its Yongbyon reactor in July and promised to disable it by year's end in exchange for energy aid and political concessions from the nations that participate in talks on its nuclear program: the U.S., China, Japan, South Korea and Russia.

Disabling the reactor would mark a further breakthrough in efforts to convince the North to scale back its nuclear program. The country conducted its first-ever nuclear test in October of last year.

Hill said the U.S. hoped to disable the North's uranium enrichment program by the end of the year, not just its plutonium-production facilities at Yongbyon.

"By the end of the year, on the road to denuclearization, we hope to have arrived at an important milestone, where there is a complete disablement of the Yongbyon facilities, a full list of additional facilities for disablement, and that uranium enrichment is also resolved to mutual satisfaction," Hill said.

Hill said he hoped to start talks with North Korea in the next weeks over the list of facilities — another promise made by the regime under a Feb. 13 agreement — and that it should include programs other than the ones at Yongbyon, as well as nuclear materials.

Hill also said the U.S. remained worried over the alleged transfer of nuclear technology and materials from North Korea to countries like Syria. Last month, Israel reportedly conducted an air strike in Syria that targeted a partially built nuclear reactor made with North Korean help.

"Proliferation has been a primary concern of ours all along," Hill said. "We have to be vigilant about this. We have to be continuing to watch closely (proliferation to) areas of concern ... including Syria," he said.

Still, North Korea appeared to be opening up through the regional engagement over its nuclear program, Hill said, pointing to a flurry of diplomatic activity by Pyongyang in recent months.

The North has opened or restored relations with five countries since July, and senior officials have visited Russia, Southeast Asia, Africa and the Middle East — a rare burst of international activity.

Hill said Washington was working with the North to prepare to remove it from a U.S. list of states sponsoring terrorism, but that Pyongyang ultimately needed to meet requirements stipulated under U.S. law.

Taking Pyongyang off the terror list, long a key demand of the North, was one of a series of economic and political concessions offered for the country to disable its nuclear reactor that produces plutonium for bombs.

"The DPRK wants very much to be delisted. we are prepared to work with them," Hill said, referring to North Korea's official name, the Democratic Republic of North Korea.

"They're on the list for a reason because they've been supporting terrorism in some respect. So we've gotten the DPRK to talk to U.S. lawyers about what they have to do," Hill said. He added that U.S. would not strike North Korea from the list — or form diplomatic ties — without the regime's full denuclearization.