US, North Korea set July timeline to shut reactor
Ap, Tokyo
The top US nuclear negotiator arrived in Japan Saturday to discuss his surprise visit to North Korea, which he said yielded an agreement that could lead to a shutdown of the communist state's plutonium-producing reactor in July. Christopher Hill the chief US negotiator at international talks on North Korea's nuclear programmes said that the Yongbyon reactor would be shutdown after the North and the UN's nuclear watchdog agree on how to monitor the process. "We expect this to be soon, but probably within three weeks ... though I don't want to be pinned down on a date," Hill told reporters in Tokyo, after briefing his Japanese counterpart on the outcome of his two-day surprise trip to the North Korea capital.Hill told CNN on Friday that the shutdown could be expected "within two weeks" of the arrival there next week of UN inspectors, putting the date sometime in July.
|
|
