North Korea may abandon nuclear freeze

The U.S. suspects North Korea has used the programme to build nuclear weapons

SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea has threatened to pull out of a 1994 nuclear deal with the United States, saying Washington has failed to uphold terms of the agreement.

The warning came less than a week after a top U.S. official said Washington would resume talks soon with North Korea, raising hopes that the stalled reconciliation process between the two Koreas might get back on track.

High-level talks between Pyongyang and the United States came to a halt when former U.S. president Bill Clinton, who came close to a missile agreement, left office in January.

North Korea agreed in 1994 to freeze its nuclear program -- which U.S. officials suspected was being used to make nuclear weapons -- in exchange for two nuclear reactors to be built by a U.S.-led consortium.

But funding and contractual problems, as well as political tensions, have delayed completion of the project by several years.

"The failure by the U.S. to live up to its obligation ... by the year 2003 would possibly drive us to respond to it with abandoning (the) ongoing nuclear freeze," the North's foreign media outlet, KCNA, said in a report.

"We cannot sit idle over our loss while maintaining the nuclear freeze," the agency said.

Verification issues

North Korea maintains it has upheld its part of the of the agreement, but Washington has said there are verification issues.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Wednesday that the United States has no intention of abandoning the agreement.

"Our position has always been that we intended to abide by the agreed framework," he said. "And we expect them to abide by the agreed framework."

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il

North Korea has made similar threats in recent months without acting on them.

It recently said it might scrap a moratorium on missile tests, but North Korean leader Kim Jong Il told a European Union delegation this month that he would extend the moratorium until 2003.

Reflecting the communist North's dependency on the nation it often denounces, the United States said this past weekend that it would donate 100,000 tons of commodities to the U.N. World Food Program for distribution in North Korea.

No direct talks

In Hanoi Wednesday, U.S. and North Korean officials sat across from each other -- but held no direct talks -- during an informal dinner for participants in security discussions sponsored by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Some officials had speculated that U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly might use the Hanoi dinner as a chance to restart talks with Communist North Korea.

Kelly said he did not talk with North Korea delegate Ri Yong Ho during the dinner, but that he might exchange pleasantries with him sometime during the two days of the conference.

On a visit to Seoul last week, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said the United States was concluding a review of North Korea policy and would resume talks with the North "in the near future."

Invitation from Washington

Meanwhile, a U.S. think-tank has invited a senior North Korean official to Washington next month, but does not expect him to come until the Bush administration completes a policy review, an academic source said Wednesday.

"We don't have any indication that the North Korean government intends to accept an invitation," said Michael Spirtas, a senior fellow at the Center for National Policy.

"I don't think [Vice Foreign Minister Kim Gye-gwan] is going to come until the review is complete, and only then if the review advocates engagement with North Korea in some form," added the academic source.

The Korea Herald newspaper reported in its early Thursday edition that Kim would visit the United States in early June and possibly hold informal talks with Washington.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.