North Korea has begun to reassemble its main nuclear facility, citing a delayed removal from a US list of terror sponsors, Japanese media and Fox News reported yesterday.
Japan's public broadcaster NHK and Kyodo News agency said North Korea started putting its Yongbyon facility back together Tuesday. The reports cited unidentified officials related to the disarmament talks.
North Korea last week said it had stopped disabling its nuclear reactor and threatened to restore the plutonium-producing facility, citing Washington's failure to remove it from the list of terror sponsors.
In response, Washington repeated its demand that North Korea must first agree to a plan to verify an accounting of nuclear programs it submitted in June, if it wants to be taken off the list.
Kyodo said the reassembling started at the Yongbyon facility on Tuesday.
Fox News carried a similar report from Washington, quoting an unidentified U.S. official as saying that the North has been threatening the move for some time and it is considered as a way for it to express anger and "to put further pressure on us."